[Mayank_V_Labh]

The reason is BlackBerry is the best physical keyboard manufacturer for a mobile device and no one is even close when it comes to that
Plus it's a no-physical-keyboard world that we are living in now
So no competition

Posted via CB10

[davinci4real]

Blackberry owns so many patents that if a competitor did release a keyboard the design would be an abomination.

Bwahahaha. Love that

From Zarafet my Z30.

[early2bed]

I'm not sure you can say that a Apple chooses design elements in iPhones because they are cheaper to make. iPhones usually feel like they are made of more expensive components like the milled aluminum. Even the glass screen was an expensive choice of the original iPhone.

I can see how sliders can be more expensive to service because they are prone to mechanical problems. On PrecentraI was always amazed to read how many times people had to return their Palm Pres because of the Oreo effect. Some of the carriers cited these high return rates as a problem.

Hardware keyboards are more inefficient for international releases because you need a different model for each language. I'm pretty sure that companies like Gazelle buy tons of older iPhones to ship overseas for sale in markets where people buy their phones outright.

I think Apples recent smaller packaging is based on environmental concerns. I'll bet that any savings on transportation costs are offset by easier theft and breakage of smaller packages. Think of those USB flash drives that are sold in huge blister packs even though they must be much more expensive to ship than little gum-size containers would be.

[randall2580]

Even having a great keyboard is no guarantee of sales success. There is nothing from the sales data that suggests the Q10 has sold anywhere near the quantities expected of it.

There apparently is a very small segment of the market that demands it and mostly those folks seem to want the "classic" BlackBerry experience, or so we are now being led to believe.

[Batmark]

Lol. Good one.

I like BB10...and that's all that matters to me.

[Dirtymike14]

I'm more surprised that neither of them have come up with a hub like BlackBerry has

Posted via CB10

[Cyanide971]

I must admit, the limited time I had my Z30 made me a believer of the BB on-screen keyboard. It is much better than what the stock Google keyboard or after market apps offer.

But concerning other brands, count me in as one who would buy it. Even though I have used the Razr Maxx HD ever since it's inception, before that I was an exclusive keyboard user having owned the Droid 2, 3, & 4!

Was always hoping Motorola would make the rumored Droid 5, using the keyboard from the Droid 4, with the battery and display of the Maxx HD.

[lactose]

I get the feeling that the industry is pushing harder towards screen only than people really want to go. Maybe the sales numbers prove me wrong, but my experience with keyboard phones has been very positive. Once I got to understand my old Bold 9650, it was so pleasurable to move around so quickly on that phone. For me the ultimate would be that kind of speed, with some of the BB10 features. I am so hoping there will be a Q20.

[teeuwen]

HTC made a qwerty phone, it was terrible. The keyboard integration was really wonky with android. For example you could type a message in chat with the keyboard but you couldn't send it press it by pushing enter on the keyboard, you had to push send on the touch screen.

Pretty much the only thing the phone had going for it at the time was better specs then most BlackBerry phones. Now it's a completely different story, I have a Q10 and it far and away blows the phone away.

Posted via CB10

[Dunt Dunt Dunt]

I think Android and Microsoft OEM are pretty clear on what form factors sell.

There seems to be a very small group of people that really want a physical keyboard over a larger display... and most of those people are BlackBerry fans and are going to bother with an Android or Microsoft keyboard device. So as long as BlackBerry is around they pretty much have that niche covered. Based on the combined sales of the Q10, Q5, and the Bolds and Curves still out there on the market.... it ain't much of a niche.

[sinsin07]

is anyone else surprised that windows or android companies more so havent come out with a premium qwerty android device just to snag those stragglers on bbos7 & belowsnip...

Not a surprise at all.

They took a look at Blackberry and saw where keyboard phones were headed and did the opposite.

Looks like it was a smart move.

[richardat]

is anyone else surprised that windows or android companies more so havent come out with a premium qwerty android device just to snag those stragglers on bbos7 & below and try to convert bb10 qwerty users? i know its a very small market but itd be an easy extra 10million at least maybe even 50 million if the phone was nice enough.

correct me if im wrong but ive only seen rubbish low budget android qwerties running 2.0 which isnt surprising that theyve failed in the past

The thing is, that market might be very, very small. There are essentially no bb10 qwerty users (in the grand scale we're talking about), and though there is a base of OS7 users, one must ask questions:
1.how many chose this primarily for other reasons (ie. all that was offered at the time, cheap BIS, popularity in that market)
2.how many will continue to choose this as those other reasons evaporate...

If NA and other developed nations are any indicator, as various high-end and cheap touchscreen devices come in, there are actually a very small percentage that don't move away from keyboards in the end - the most "advanced" (at least in terms of time/evolution), being the US, where the keyboard hold-outs is pretty tiny these days - there is little reason to think other parts of the world won't do the same - in fact, we've seen pretty clearly they have/are.

One can't just look at the remaining bb07 userbase - it might actually be a pretty small number of the remaining BB07 userbase, and of of that small number, maybe some will be loyal to the BB brand anyways - so in the end, the numbers may be be potentially very low. The manufacturers probably weigh this against the cost of designing/producing a physical keyboard - and so far they've rejected the idea.

Having said all that, I think there may be a decent niche market for it - the low numbers may be deceiving, as I just painted them - as I did not take into account those who rejected the keyboard but only because they wanted ios or android. I think there may well be a hidden, decent-sized market for a well-made ios or android device with keyboard.

[LP_Rigg]

The world moves forward and BB moves back to legacy and concentration on qwerty? It seems the majority want a bigger all touch device, particularly with the advancements in all touch keyboards. My wife got a company issued 9970 recently and absolutely hates it as she is so use to more advanced/recent tech. She uses a S4 for her personal device much to my chagrin.

[co4nd]

Android and Windows Phone have one target and that's the iPhone, it Apple came out with a physical keyboard they would as well. Basically they try and improve on iPhones in screen size, cpu cores, camera pixels, or device cost. If it wasn't for Apple, Android (If it even existed) would be copying Blackberry and Microsoft would be selling Windows Mobile 6.89.3456 with a stylus.

[Soulstream]

Well, we can see from the BB market share that the QWERTY market is rapidly shrinking. if 99% of people want touchscreen and of the rest most buy cheap phones (see the OS7 sales), there isn't much profit to be made.

Today's virtual keyboards are really good (I use Swiftkey on my Nexus5) and I can actually type really fast. While I think I could type a little (maybe 10%) faster on a qwerty phone the sacrifice of screen size isn't worth it for me.

[Laura Knotek]

Nokia had those somewhat successful physical keyboard devices a few years ago, like E71. (I hope I remembered that model number correctly.)
They were Symbian devices, IIRC. A bit surprised they haven't made a WP in similar form factor since they already know how to build it.

That's it. I had the E71 back in 2009.


Sent from my Nokia Lumia 920 using Tapatalk

[cgk]

Nokia had those somewhat successful physical keyboard devices a few years ago, like E71. (I hope I remembered that model number correctly.)
They were Symbian devices, IIRC. A bit surprised they haven't made a WP in similar form factor since they already know how to build it.

I had the e71, it was a great device - one of my favourites.