New BlackBerry 5G phone with Android and physical keyboard to arrive in 2021

The once-respected BlackBerry brand has once again been licensed from a company that hopes to use a household name to break into the competitive Android phone market. This time, a new Texas startup named OnwardMobility is taking the reins, promising to release a BlackBerry 5G device with Android and a physical QWERTY keyboard in 2021.

Little is known about the device, including screen size or internal specs, but OnwardMobility says The register it would come with a completely new keyboard design that “will reflect the brand values ​​from a typing experience and an input experience.” Who, yes, of course! I love to reflect the values ​​of the brand. Do it all the time.

It looks like OnwardMobility will steer the device towards corporate clients, with a focus on the phone’s ability to work on the go (surely less appealing in a pandemic?) And its security features. This all makes sense, given that these are the attributes that have drawn so many customers to BlackBerry devices in the past.

It also looks like the device isn’t the flagship standard, but probably a healthy mid-range. As Peter Franklin, CEO of OnwardMobility said The register: “For us, our priority is not only to manufacture the safest and most productive device, but also to be an everyday device. It means things like a top-notch camera and other specs that you expect from your phone every day. At the same time, we know we have to be competitive, just like our prices. “

Image: OnwardMobility

It’s worth remembering how strange BlackBerry’s journey has been as a brand. BlackBerry devices were the rulers of the mobile world at the end of the years, but Android and iOS have taken off and sales have plunged.

There was sort of a reboot from 2013, when a number of devices running BlackBerry 10 were released (including the fantastic square shaped BlackBerry Passport). Then, in 2015, the company finally switched to Android with the BlackBerry Priv and its sliding keyboard. In 2016, it stopped making its own phones altogether and licensed the brand to Chinese manufacturer TCL. TCL will lose the rights to this brand from August 31 of this year, which apparently paved the way for OnwardMobility to move into it. (A side note: Indian telecommunications company Optiemus Infracom as well has made their own BlackBerry branded Android devices, but they are only available in the Indian market.)

This makes it the fourth or fifth iteration of BlackBerry devices, depending on how you like to count them. And call us stupid, stupid, or just morbid, but we’re still very curious to see exactly what OnwardMobility has to offer.

The new phone will be manufactured by FIH Mobile, a subsidiary of manufacturing giant Foxconn. It will be available in North America and Europe “in the first half of 2021”.