Blackberry Venice To Blackberry Priv: Will It Resurrect A Dying Blackberry Ltd.?

They used to be the gold standard in enterprise mobility. Today, theirs is a company on the throes of its death, and most likely, not even adopting the other main mobile OS platform would be able to save this company’s imminent slide into obscurity.

Rumors of the Android-powered Blackberry have been swirling for months. Droid Report first spilled the beans on the device, then-named the Blackberry Venice. Recent reports indicate that the device may roll out as “Blackberry Priv,” which is a nod to Blackberry’s goal for creating very secure Androids, after the company’s original sensibilities in creating the world’s most secure smartphones.

Blackberry was well-loved for its secure OS and unparalleled, practically hack-proof encryption. However, after the iPhone and the Android dominated the market, the platform and the company fell into steady decline. The phone was once a mobile marvel, creating a subculture around its physical keyboard. Teenagers were depicted as being glued to their Blackberrys on the dinner table, while corporate types were caricatured as being wired to their Blackberrys on the commutes. Even workaholic fathers were not spared the lampooning, as they were depicted typing away on their Blackberrys’ springy keys, even as they took part in family vacations. The Blackberry was such an icon, that the word and website “Crackberry” was built as an ode to the device.

While rabid Blackberry fans could only hope that this Android-powered device could save the company, yet, it remains to be seen, as the market is now saturated with choices, and new players are even bursting through the secure Android niche.

BlackBerry Ltd. CEO John Chen describes their latest effort as a way to merge the need for a secure mobile device, as well as to cater to the demographic that miss the physical keyboard on their devices, while giving them access to Google Play’s ocean of apps.

Whether this effort will pull in the sales and profit that the company direly needs in order to be resurrected, remains to be seen.

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For more on Blackberry Venice here is the previous post on Droid Report: https://www.droidreport.com/blackberry-venice-rumored-slider-beauty-curved-usable-edges-10808

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For more on secure Androids, here is the category on Droid Report: https://www.droidreport.com/taxonomy/term/22865