BlackBerry is proud to announce its latest smartphone made in collaboration with the Porsche Design luxury brand: meet the new BlackBerry Porsche Design P'9983.
The premium smartphone made its debut at a special event in Dubai ahead of its commercial launch next month, when it will become available from Porsche Design stores, select carriers, and retailers.
"The Porsche Design P'9983 smartphone from BlackBerry makes a statement about its owner's impeccable taste and drive for achievement and success, as well as discernment in making the right choices with products that help them stay on top," Porsche Design Group CEO Juergen Gessler touted in the press release. "Yet again, the collaboration with BlackBerry has led to a product that blends style and functionality to provide a true luxury experience."
"Today we mark yet another milestone in delivering an experience that goes beyond luxury," added Ron Louks, President of Devices and Emerging Solutions at BlackBerry. "The first QWERTY Porsche Design smartphone with BlackBerry 10 experience combines superior productivity, ultimate security and privacy and the performance of the best professional tool with the opportunity to express individual style with the luxury of being one step ahead."
The Porsche Design P'9983 is the third device made by BlackBerry in collaboration with Porsche Design, joining the BlackBerry Porsche P'9981 and the Porsche Design P'9982.
In terms of hardware, the Porsche Design P'9983 doesn't come with top-notch specs and features on board, at least not compared to today's high-end flagships. The smartphone has a 3.1-inch HD touch screen and a dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor under the hood, clocked at 1.5GHz and paired with 2GB of RAM. Other specs include 64GB of internal storage capacity, expandable up to 128GB via microSD, an 8-megapixel rear camera, a 2-megapixel front shooter, and a 2,100 mAh battery to keep things up and running. Connectivity options consist of LTE, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n, Bluetooth 4.0, FM radio, micro-USB, and micro-HDMI.
The highlight of the smartphone, however, lies in its premium build, as it boasts a stylish chassis and logo made of forged stainless steel, it has a special glass-weave technology on its back, a sapphire glass camera lens, and "specially-crafted glass-like keys with the durability of rigid synthetic material, and a special 3D effect with silver font characters."
Another feature BlackBerry touts for this handset is the Unique PIN, which makes each user instantly recognizable from other Porsche Design users. On the software side, the new BlackBerry Porsche Design P'9983 runs BlackBerry 10.3, which includes all of the BlackBerry 10 OS goodies such as BlackBerry Hub, BlackBerry World, and others, but also provides access to Amazon's Appstore for Android, as a result of the deal the two companies recently made.
Aftermarket accessories for the new BlackBerry Porsche Design P'9983 will include handcrafted Italian leather backdoors for a more luxurious touch, which will come in Yellow, Blue, Orange, Blue Green, Dark Brown, Paloma Grey, Pomegranate, and Salsa color options.
The company released no pricing details at this point, but more information should become available closer to launch. In the meantime, check out the unboxing video below to get a better idea of the BlackBerry Porsche Design P'9983.