Update 1: BlackBerry has confirmed to TechRadar that a new BBOS7 handset is indeed on the way. "We intend to launch one additional product this year to support the BlackBerry 7 segment", a spokesperson told us.
Update 2: CEO Thorsten Heins is also repeating the BB7 line this week, this time to shareholders at the company's annual meeting for the group. According to Engadget, he told the group that one BB7-packing phone is due before 2013 runs its course.
Original article...
BlackBerry 10 may be grabbing most of the headlines, but it's the older BlackBerry 7 devices that appear to be keeping the company afloat, as details of a new model recently poked out.
A user agent profile (UAProf) document spotted last week shows some deets for a device called the Bold 9720. It's powered by the company's older BB7 operating system instead of the shiny new BlackBerry 10.
The existence of the phone should come as no surprise: Heins said during the company's dismal June 28 quarterly earnings report that sure enough, another BB7 handset was due.
A new BB7 handset may seem like the wrong direction for BlackBerry until you consider that only 2.7 million of the 6.8 million handsets shipped last quarter were actually running the BB10.
Same as it ever was
According to the UAProf document posted by Twitter user @Bla1ze, the BlackBerry Bold 9720 appears to be a fairly typical addition to the manufacturer's Bold lineup.
Running the elder OS 7.1 and sporting the company's legendary QWERTY hardware keyboard with a 480 x 360 screen resolution, the latest Bold seems destined to excite only the BlackBerry faithful.
However, images leaked on the ThaiBBClub show the 9720 borrows a few design cues from the recent BlackBerry Q5, mixed with classic Curve style.
Although BlackBerry has confirmed the existence of the handset, there's no word yet exactly on when and where the Bold 9720 will wind up in the coming months, not to mention for how much.
- BlackBerry 7 maybe getting some attention, but PlayBook owners aren't going to have the same luck.
