Although its share of the smartphone market has dipped to less than 1%, BlackBerry (TSX:BB)(NASDAQ:BBRY) continues to introduce new phones. Its latest offering, dubbed the DTEK50, officially went on sale earlier this week.
Like the Priv, the phone released by the company for Christmas, 2015, the DTEK50 runs on Android, completely bypassing BlackBerry’s own operating system. In fact, consumers have likely seen the last of BlackBerry handsets powered by BlackBerry 10.
BlackBerry is pushing security on its newest offering, leveraging one of its strengths. It’s promoting its latest offering as "the world’s most secure smartphone."
The other thing going for this new device is the price, with the phone being offered at $299. Although that’s not quite as cheap as many of its Android-powered rivals, it’s still much cheaper than the starting price for many of BlackBerry’s previous phones.
Reviews of the new phone are mixed so far, but tend to be positive. With the company’s last few phones flopping, however, it seems unlikely this new offering will be enough to really move the company’s bottom line.
Investors seemed to cheer the news, sending BlackBerry shares up nearly 10% on the week, which is the stock’s best performance in months.
