BlackBerry Priv will be expensive

The rumor mill has put a price tag on the upcoming BlackBerry Priv handset, and this smartphone won’t be cheap.

That likely won’t come as a surprise though, given the noises that have already been made about this being a premium phone, and BlackBerry’s chief executive John Chen has even previously said that the device will have a top-end price tag.

And according to GSM Arena, which spotted a post by Chinese leaker Leaksfly on Weibo, the Priv will weigh in at CNY 3,999, which is around £410 or $630. Of course, the price in pounds is likely to be much closer to that dollar figure than a direct translation from Chinese currency.

The BlackBerry Priv (which stands for privacy -- and also, rather confusingly, for privilege by all accounts) is expected to be released in 2016, and will run Android rather than BlackBerry OS in a move to attract more users.

We’ve already seen official pictures and it looks to be a very smart device, a slim slider phone which allows the user to slide the display up to reveal a full physical keyboard.

Essentially it’s the last throw of the dice for BlackBerry smartphones. If this one doesn’t work using Android as a springboard, it’s hard to see how the company will push forward on the mobile front.

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