BackBlackberry to launch sub-$200 smartphone in April
The device, codenamed Jakarta, will first go on sale in Indonesia in April
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Barcelona: BlackBerry Ltd unveiled a new, cheaper smartphone on Tuesday as it tries to stem losses and win back customers in emerging economies where customers are gravitating toward devices powered by Google’s Android operating system.
The device is being built under a partnership deal with FIH Mobile Ltd - the Hong Kong-listed unit of Taiwanese electronics giant Foxconn.
The device, codenamed Jakarta, will first go on sale in Indonesia in April for under $200, said John Chen, BlackBerry’s new chief executive, who took the reins at the company late last year.
The company also plans to launch a new tool for business and government customers to manage mobile devices on their networks.
BlackBerry said BES12, which is to be launched by the end of 2014, will unify the existing BES10 and BES5 platforms that its clients currently use to manage mobile devices on their internal corporate and government networks.
While BES5 manages BlackBerry’s older generation of devices, its BES10 offering allows clients to manage its new generation of devices powered by its BlackBerry 10 operating system, along with devices that run on Apple’s iOS operating system and Google’s market-leading Android operating system.
BlackBerry on Monday announced it was also going to make the tool available to Microsoft’s Windows Phone and its upcoming Nokia X platforms in the coming months. REUTERS
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