Did the BlackBerry Porsche Design P'9982 just visit the FCC?

Back in August, we showed you some Hi-Res shots of a new Porsche Design handset expected to be launched in the middle of 2014 by BlackBerry. You might recall that the original Porsche Design model featured a futuristic looking QWERTY keyboard and looked like a BlackBerry Bold 9930 from the future. The stainless steel frame and the leather back conveyed a sense of luxury, and the BlackBerry 7 OS flavored model was priced as such. With a price tag of $2000, this phone was clearly not for everyone.

With the BlackBerry P'9981 now over two years old, the newer model we showed you in August brings plenty of changes. Named the BlackBerry P'9982, it is expected to be made out of aluminum and leather and will be based on the all-touch BlackBerry Z10. Gone is the QWERTY of the future and BlackBerry 10 now is running the show. One thing that hasn't changed is the price tag, which is still expected to read $2000.

What brought the P'9982 to our attention, besides watching a Jetsons marathon on cable, is our scan of the FCC's sign-in sheets to see which devices have recently paid a visit to the August body. We should mention that the device appears to work over AT&T's HSPA+ and LTE pipelines.

Is there really a market for what is essentially a $2000 BlackBerry Z10? After all, the Canadian manufacturer recently had to write off nearly $1 billion worth of the device that is collecting dust in the warehouse. And even if there is a market for this, shouldn't resources be directed toward making BlackBerry more competitive with iOS, Android and yes, Windows Phone?


source: FCC