BlackBerry considers what success it could find with a phablet
It’s been a while since we last had the opportunity to talk about BlackBerry at any length, checking in with CEO John Chen to hear about the company’s current efforts in Indonesia with the new Z3. While phones will continue to be BlackBerry’s core business (at least when it comes to hardware), we know that it’s been at least keeping an open mind when it comes to other form factors; we’re not expecting to see another PlayBook anytime soon, but we’ve heard execs say that the idea isn’t completely unpalatable. Today we’re setting our sights on something a little more compact (though just a little), as John Chen talks about the possibility of a BlackBerry phablet.
In an interview with the Jakarta Post, Chen acknowledges that there’s a market for devices falling in size between phones and tablets, and says that if BlackBerry ever does release another product that pushes beyond traditional phone boundaries, it’s likely to be a phablet of some kind. Specifically, he points to a phablet as something that’s far more likely to come from BlackBerry than another tablet.
That said, none of this comes off as making BlackBerry look particularly enthusiastic about expanding into phablet offerings, and it’s instead painted more as an acknowledgment that a demand exists, rather than a teaser for an upcoming device. Indeed, Chen’s comments about what he might do if he “had the opportunity” to go with a phablet suggest that the idea’s not perceived as exactly realistic right now. But maybe the important part is that BlackBerry’s open to it, so we’ll be keeping an eye out for larger BlackBerry handsets as we look to the company’s offerings in 2015 and beyond.
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