A few days ago, Research in Motion officially announced its latest lineup of Blackberry smartphones. All of the new phones support the new Blackberry Phone 7 operating system. However, the company is already looking to the future. That future is linked with Blackberry"s QNX operating system, the same one that currently powers the Playbook tablet. Today Boy Genius Report ran a story via unnamed sources that claims the first Blackberry smartphone that will support the QNX operating system will finally launch sometime in the first quarter of 2012.
The smartphone itself is codenamed the BlackBerry Colt, according to the story. However, it adds that the phone itself might be underpowered compared to its biggest smartphone rivals that are coming from Apple, HTC, Samsung, Motorola and other makers. The story claims the BlackBerry Colt will launch with only a single-core processor at a time when the industry has already moved on to dual core processors and could be close to launching quad-core based smartphones. It adds, "it’s entirely possible that it could change ahead of the device’s release, our source said, but the internal testing going on right now is with a single-core chip."
Research in Motion is already dealing with a lot of pressure as its once mighty Blackberry smartphones have lost market share in the past couple of years to Apple"s iPhone and the various phones based on Google"s Android. Earlier this year the company launched its first tablet product, the Blackberry Playbook, to poor reviews and sales. In July, RIM announced plans to lay off 2,000 of its workers.