BlackBerry Might Unveil A Second Android Handset In 2016, After Gauging Priv's Performance

Last week, BlackBerry posted its third quarter results showing an increase in the revenue after a long time. CEO John Chen acknowledged that the BlackBerry Priv running the Android OS has been well-received and the company will launch the same device in about 31 countries in 2016. A new report now has said that the Canadian tech giant might introduce a new Android device next year.

Gadgets 360 picked up a Bloomberg interview where Chen hinted the possibility of a mid-range Android phone. But then, he was quick to point out that BlackBerry’s main focus will be to deliver high-end devices.

When questioned about the future of BlackBerry with regard to Android OS, Chen said, "[It] depends on the Priv. If the Priv is well received in the market and looks like it is. There's a good chance [...], we will still focus on the high-end probably closer to mid-range coming out in 2016."

However, when asked about an approximate timeframe for the second Android device, Chen said, the possibility of a new handset entirely depends on how BlackBerry Priv performs in the next couple of months.

With the plan to introduce the Priv in 31 new markets in the next three months, BlackBerry should be able to gauge the performance sometime in the first half of 2016. It is worth noting that BlackBerry started selling the Priv in the U.S. and home country Canada back in November.

Even though, the CEO has not revealed any substantial information about the second Android device, an unnamed BlackBerry smartphone visited a benchmark testing site strutting Samsung's Exynos chipset on board. Tied to the model name STV100-1, GFXBench showed the BlackBerry device powered by an octa-core Exynos 7420 SoC, running at 2.1 GHz. Therefore, it goes without saying that BlackBerry is indeed working on a new Android device.

Here is a leaked photo of the BlackBerry Vienna rumored to be running the Android OS: