BlackBerry Goes Back To Roots, Launches Keyboard Equipped Smartphone 'Classic'

BlackBerry has launched a new keyboard equipped smartphone named 'Classic,' in hope to win back market share and retain users still using older version of its physical keyboard devices.

The new smartphone has striking similarity to its once-bestselling Bold and Curve handsets. The smartphone restores the features that were abandoned last year with the release of new operating system.

'Classic' features a qwerty keyboard, trackpad and call and hang-up buttons resting below a touch screen. It boosts a larger screen, longer battery life and expanded app library with access to the offerings from amazon.com Android App store. The phone also equips a browser that is three times faster than those found on previous version of BlackBerry devices.

"BlackBerry Classic is the powerful communications tool that many BlackBerry Bold and Curve users have been waiting for," Chief Executive Officer John Chen said in a statement. He also noted that Classic is bringing back the command bar functionalities that helped make its legacy devices easy to navigate.

Share of BlackBerry fell less than 1 percent in global smartphone market as users started preferring iPhones and Android devices more.

However, people who are hard-core email users, still prefer smartphones with qwerty keyboard.

"It's tempting in a rapidly changing, rapidly growing mobile market to change for the sake of change - to mimic what's trendy," Chen said in the post. "But there's also something to be said for the classic adage, if it ain't broke don't fix it."

In September this year, BlackBerry released another keyboard-equipped device, a square-screened Passport.

According to reports, preorders for the Classic in some regions has already temporarily sold out.