Monday, August 8, 2011

BlackBerry Colt may be RIM's first QNX smartphone, will lack BES support out-of-box?

To many, a colt is a representation of rebirth and a symbol for youthfulness. Research in Motion appears to be in desperate need for exactly that -- a regeneration. It seems appropriate, then, that RIM may be launching the BlackBerry Colt, its first QNX-based "superphone," in the first quarter of 2012. This timeline will ensure the device launches at the expected time, according to rumors by BGR, but there's likely to be a few compromises to ensure it gets pushed out to market faster. The Colt is said to be undergoing internal testing with a single-core chip, contrary to promises of including dual-core CPUs. Additionally, the maiden voyage of the smartphone platform may be completely devoid of BES at the device's launch; it's taken longer than expected to rewrite the proper code to support QNX, and more time's necessary to bring it up to par with RIM's standards. What would the Enterprise customers do in the meantime? The alternative to BES is almost unthinkable: Exchange emails would be accessed by a preloaded version of Microsoft ActiveSync. Will the gamble yield greater returns in the long run, or will it remove the glue that still holds the company together?