BlackBerry Z3 Smartphone comes to India for Rs 15,990

The highly awaited BlackBerry Z3 smartphone for the masses made its bow in the Indian market and while most of us expected a mass-product to be priced around $200 mark, the company managed to spoil the fun by pricing at a higher Rs 15,990 mark. At this price, Z3 is more of a mid-range device than an affordable product that the company has been touting it to be.

Justifying the said price, Sunil Lalwani, CEO, BlackBerry India said that in comparison to other markets, India has a higher VAT and excise duty tax that makes it impossible to keep the Z3 pricing at $200 mark. Add to the fact that you have BlackBerry Z10 selling at Rs 17,990 (after numerous ‘festive' price cuts), the positioning of Z3 falls between targeting the youth and the generic business consumers.

BlackBerry Z3 sports a 5 inch 960x540 pixels display, powered by BlackBerry OS 10.2.1 and packs a 1.2 GHz dual-core Snapdragon 400 CPU clubbed with 1.5 GB RAM. The company has added a 5 MP rear snapper with LED flash and 1 MP front camera. With BlackBerry devices you get the assured set of services like BlackBerry Messenger (BBM), BlackBerry Priority Hub and even the introduction of BlackBerry Maps. Keeping the consumer's demand in mind, Z3 comes with a bigger display and a bigger non-removable battery unit of 2500 mAh. Android app portability makes things rosier for prospective BlackBerry buyers as the native BlackBerry World app ecosystem has yet to reach the levels of Android and iOS.

BlackBerry has announced special voucher schemes on Z3 for users pre-ordering the device from either of Flipkart and The Mobile Store starting from June 25 to July 2. With Z3, BlackBerry has initiated its 5-year agreement for devices with Foxconn.