Once considered among the flag-bearers of technology in the smartphone industry, Blackberry was on the verge of going out-of-business before the brand was purchased by TCL back in 2016. With the lack of any new models in the past year, Blackberry devices are likely to remain as midrange budget offerings in the near future. If you are holding on to hopes of seeing a 5G Blackberry, TCL has made a formal announcement confirming that there are no such plans as of now.
In an announcement made during a CCS Insight event in London, Stefan Streit, TCL’s General Manager of Marketing said, “There is no point of 5G on a Blackberry. The device is not for entertainment and emails are already quite fast”. Having shown great enthusiasm for a major part of 2018, Blackberry devices have been largely missing in action since the beginning of 2019.
It is not that TCL is not investing in 5G. They are exploring other opportunities where the 5G technology can be useful, like an 8K TV or a Smart fridge. TCL is focused on introducing their own lineup of 5G smartphones under the Plex brand name. While also introducing the technology to Alcatel, the second smartphone brand under their banner. The company plans on introducing affordable smartphones by the middle of 2020.
According to CCS Insights, the prices of 5G smartphones will plummet in 2020 due to oversupply. The analytics firm reasons that there are so many devices available across the globe that supply will overpower demand shortly causing widespread price cuts. At the onset of 2022 alone the adoption of 5G will outpace that of 4G in the first three years!
TCL Plex 5G Specifications and Features
In related news, TCL unveiled their first 5G smartphone named TCL Plex 5G at the IFA 2019 in September. The device features a 6.53-inch display with a dedicated chipset that converts standard dynamic range content to high dynamic range, presenting additional true colors tones. The smartphone draws power from a Qualcomm Snapdragon 675 SoC with 6GB of RAM and 128GB of native storage. It has a triple camera layout starting with a 48-megapixel sensor, along with a 16-megapixel lens and a 2-megapixel sensor. The device sports a 3,820 mAh battery. TCL aims at pricing the 5G variant below the $1000 mark, although there is no official announcement yet.
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