When Chen took over, he made it very clear that BB was going to be focusing on two markets:
- Emerging markets where BB is still popular/well-regarded (relatively), and,
- Regulated enterprises.
Notice that the (mature-market) consumer market is
no where on this list. He's not building these phones for that market, because he's not targeting that market. BB did that in 2013 and nearly destroyed itself.
The Z3 is for emerging markets. It's competing against phones like the Moto G and the Lumia 520, plus a bunch of cheaper but still surprisingly well-spec'ed phones from Chinese manufacturers that are currently selling very well in these markets. It is not, and was never intended to be a phone for the US, Canada, or Europe.
The Q20 is targeted at the regulated enterprise market, most of whom are still using legacy BBOS devices. Chen is hoping to give them a phone that is very easy to transition onto from BBOS, hence the "belt" of buttons. Again, this phone is NOT targeted at the general consumer market, and Chen frankly doesn't care what consumers think of it - he cares what those big enterprise companies are asking for, because that's who he is trying to sell too.
Sure, Chen will be fine if some consumers decide to buy a Z3 or Q20 on their own, and he knows a few people will, but he's not trying to please those people. He's trying to see if the handset business is even still viable, and so he's targeting the two markets where he expects to see the greatest chance of success. If these phones flop, then you can be sure that BB will be out of the handset business. If, instead, sales of these phones are good in their respective markets, then BB can take another look at the consumer market. That's going to be 2015 at the very earliest - he's made that quite clear.
Folks need to listen to the information Chen has given, and set their expectations accordingly. Anyone who is expecting any push in the consumer market before at least 2015 is fooling themselves, and setting themselves up for disappointment.