As BlackBerry looks to turn its fortunes around, the electronics maker announces four new smartphones, including the $275 BlackBerry Leap.
Ever since the iPhone launched in 2008, the BlackBerry has been on the decline. Although BlackBerry handsets were once some of the most-used phones around, the company was slow to embrace the smartphone phenomena that quickly took over the mobile market.
But now, after years of business trickling down the pan, the once dominant company has a new look and a new strategy for regaining its profits and its power. Part of this strategy, it seems, is not to blindly chase Samsung, Apple and other smartphone heavy hitters but instead BlackBerry will do what they do best; they’ll cater to the young professionals who made such good use of their devices in yesteryear.
The first device in line with that strategy is the newly announced BlackBerry leap. In a promotional image for the phone (which you can see above) the company is very clearly looking to market to professionals who are on a budget; people who need a phone that can keep up with them but isn’t going to eat into their company’s profits before they’ve even earned a single dime. In terms of specs, the Leap has a 5-inch HD touchscreen with a dual-core 1.5 GHz processor, 2GB of RAM and an 8 megapixel camera that can record video of up to 1080p at 30FPS.
Admittedly, none of those specs really jump out at you, and the phone doesn’t even appear to have a selfie camera (how are these fresh-faced professionals going to commemorate business deals?) but BlackBerry appears to be making up for that with price. The BlackBerry Leap will be available – contract free – from just $275.
As for other phones that BlackBerry is working on, the Leap will be joined by a curved phone with a slide-out keyboard and another keyboard-based model. No word on when those will gets names/prices/specs but we’ll keep you posted once we know more.
Source: re/code
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