Reviving the BlackBerry brand has always been a dream for fans since the company left the smartphone market. However, OnwardMobility was supposed to revive the brand through cooperating with Foxconn’s FIH Mobile Limited. But the dream is now dead. OnwardMobility announced the news on its website, saying, “it is with great sadness that we announce that OnwardMobility will be shutting down, and we will no longer be proceeding with the development of an ultra-secure smartphone with a physical keyboard.”
The 5G BlackBerry dream comes to an end
This decision was made after OnwardMobility refused to launch a BlackBerry phone in 2021. So BlackBerry decided to terminate all deals with OnwardMobility and stopped licensing its name and patents. After a while, BlackBerry agreed to sell 90 patents to Huawei for over $450 million. The company could also make over $600 million by selling remaining patents. Before iPhone, Samsung, and Chinese companies could conquer the smartphone market; BlackBerry was dominating the whole market with its physical QWERTY phones. However, the company couldn’t compete with these giants and was kicked out of the market. BlackBerry launched an Android phone in 2015 called Priv. This was a failed attempt, and the company officially stopped producing phones. Many third-party manufacturers tried to revive the brand during the past few years, including TCL. But all efforts have been inconclusive. TCL launched KEYone and KEY2 LE on behalf of the BlackBerry brand. Both phones came with the same old-school physical keyboard. But in the age of big and bright screens, a physical keyboard cannot impress customers, especially the younger generation. Last month, BlackBerry officially announced that it would stop supporting BlackBerry OS from January 4th. From now on, phones running on BlackBerry OS will receive no support from the company. Though, if you are looking for a phone with a physical keyboard, you can still find some phones in the market.
