Hasta La Gadget!

True to their word, those of us living in the Great White North (or rather, Canada if you prefer to be formal) would finally be able to get hold of the BlackBerry Q10 today. Of course, we await with bated breath to see just how well (or not, as stranger things have happened in the past) the BlackBerry Q10 would sell in its own backyard, considering the extremely successful weekend launch of the BlackBerry Q10 in the UK. Those living in Canada can look forward to Telus offering the BlackBerry Q10, and if Telus is not their cup of tea, there are always Rogers and Bell waiting for you to ink that 3-year contract after forking out $199.99 for the smartphone itself, of course. For folks who prefer to pick up the BlackBerry Q10 sans contract, be warned that you could be up to $700 poorer along the way.

You might also want to check out other Canadian retailers such as Walmart and Future Shop to see whether they carry any stock of the BlackBerry Q10. Fans of the physical QWERTY keyboard on a smartphone would certainly be stoked with the availability of the BlackBerry Q10, and it would show the world whether there is still a market left for such a form factor. Those of us living in the US, we will have to wait until sometime later this May to see the BlackBerry Q10 arrive on all four major carriers.

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Blackberry CEO Thorsten Heins believes that the Blackberry Q10 will be the company’s saving grace, moreso than the Blackberry Z10. First day Blackberry Q10 sales in the UK has surpassed the company’s expectations with Carphone Warehouse’s outlet, Selfridges, saying that the device sold thousands of units per hour. Within 6 hours, the retailer sold out its entire stock of Blackberry Q10 devices in every one of its stores.

Heins states that he believes that the Q10 will be much more successful than the Z10, mainly because it offers both the new Blackberry 10 experience along with Blackberry’s classic, and loved, physical QWERTY keyboard. In an interview with Bloomberg, Heins says that Blackberry as a whole currently has a user base of 70 million, and that many die-hard Blackberry fans are expected to pick up the phone once it heads to their respective countries.

Because of Heins optimism, Blackberry’s shares rose 3.9% to $15.61, which is the highest price its had since March 21st. Thanks to the launch of Blackberry 10, Blackberry’s shares have increased a total of 32% this year. Many of the Q10′s major buyers were exporters, who SeekingAlpha reports were buying 20+ devices at a time. It got to the point where Carphone Warehouse had to make two lines; one for single-unit buyers, and one for multi-unit buyers.

Heins has high hopes for the Blackberry Q10, but some believe that his optimism may be delusional. Heins also had high expectations for the Blackberry Z10, which is currently experiencing shrinking demand in various markets. On the bright side, the Blackberry Z10 sold around 1 million units within its first quarter. The Blackberry Q10 is expected to head to major U.S. carriers by the end of May. You can check out our hands-on review of the Blackberry Q10 to see if Heins’s optimism is all hype.

[via Bloomberg]

Blackberry CEO claims the Q10 will sell “tens of millions of units” is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

While the Blackberry Z10 is certainly one of the ways the Blackberry has attempted to win over new customers with, long-time Blackberry users and loyalists are probably more familiar and more used to the company’s traditional QWERTY devices, which is why we can’t say that we’re too surprised to learn (via Seeking Alpha) that the Blackberry Q10 has managed to sell out in 90 minutes over at Selfridges! According to the report, about 2,000 units were available at Selfridges which managed to sell out in 90 minutes, with claims that employees had to keep bringing out new stock by the basket load in order to meet the demand. Of course this is just one retailer and we’re not sure what other retailers are experiencing, but this is probably good news for Blackberry, and might keep the naysayers quiet who believe that QWERTY devices may no longer be relevant.

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Skype has landed for BlackBerry 10, but would-be VoIP users will need a Q10 initially, until BlackBerry updates its initial Z10 smartphone. The new app, confirmed as incoming only earlier this week, offers voice and video calling, instant messaging, and text messaging, just like Skype on other mobile platforms; however, it requires BlackBerry 10.1, loaded from the off on the newer Q10, but still pending for the Z10.

That puts the potential audience for Skype on BlackBerry 10 relatively low, at least for the moment, though plans to update Z10 devices to OS 10.1 are already afoot. Skype says that BlackBerry expects that to happen “in the near future” at which point the app will install.

Though described as a “preview”, Skype for BlackBerry 10 does show some significant integration into the core platform. Based on a port of the Android version, rather than built natively for BB10 from the ground up, it has a new UI – suited to the Q10′s squared-off touchscreen – and automatically funnels Skype contacts into the smartphone’s phonebook.

There’s also Skype notification support in the BlackBerry Hub, which means incoming chat requests, file transfers, and contact invite requests – among other things – will pop up in the unified inbox BlackBerry refined for its latest platform. The app can be used for sharing photos, videos, and other files, as well as for making SkypeOut calls to phones not using Skype.

Skype for BlackBerry 10 is already in the BlackBerry World store, where it’s a free download.

Skype hits BlackBerry 10, but the Z10 is out of luck for now is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

We have read and heard a whole lot about the BlackBerry Q10 in recent days, especially bits and pieces of information concerning its launch price here in the US. Well, some say that the BlackBerry Q10 is a rather niche device that would have a special segment of the market partial towards it, and we think that we prefer to let time be the judge. Having said that, having the best hardware in the world is not going to save you or the platform unless there is the presence of decent software going for it. Case in point, a preview version of Skype for BlackBerry Q10 has been announced.

Definitely Skype would be one of the higher anticipated apps to be announced, especially when the BlackBerry Q10 is all set to arrive on Canadian soil on the first day of May next month. Apart from Skype, what other top notch apps will make their way to this particular platform? Apparently, BlackBerry mentioned in their “New-App Wednesday” mailing list that Facebook, Foursquare, LinkedIn, Twitter, Nobex Radio, Box, Dropbox and Angry Birds, too, will make the cut for the QWERTY device. Bear in mind that Skype for BlackBerry 10 is available in BlackBerry World, albeit for the BlackBerry Q10 and Dev Alpha C only so Z10 owners will have to sit it out for the moment.

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