RIM’s most recent announcement of the BlackBerry 10 operating system has breathed new hope into the company, and it does not look too likely that RIM will go belly up in a few months’ time, but it always pays to tread on the side of caution. Having said that, RIM CEO Thorsten Heins has mentioned during a press conference that current BlackBerry 7 smartphones will not be able to receive an upgrade to the new BlackBerry 10 platform when the latter rolls out later this year. Is this good news or bad news? In some way, it will definitely see RIM “force” previous users of perfectly working BlackBerry 7 devices having to make the upgrade if they want to enjoy the latest BlackBerry operating system, which might contribute to a more positive hardware bottom line for the Canadian company.
However, RIM did mention that there is the possibility of porting over some of the older BlackBerry 7 apps to BlackBerry 10, and RIM has also committed to supporting BlackBerry 7.1 for “a while.” Those who were running on BlackBerry 6 devices last year would have felt a sense of deja vu, as it was announced that BlackBerry 6 devices will not see any upgrades to nudge them to BlackBerry 7.
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