BlackBerry Z10 Smartphone Launches in the United States Today

Waterloo, ON – BlackBerry® (NASDAQ: BBRY; TSX: BB) announced that the all new BlackBerry® Z10 smartphone has launched today with leading carriers and authorized retailers in the United States. The (all touch) BlackBerry Z10 is the first smartphone powered by BlackBerry® 10, the re-designed, re-engineered, and re-invented BlackBerry platform that creates a new and unique mobile computing experience.

Richard Piasentin, Vice President and Managing Director for U.S.at BlackBerry said, “We are excited to bring the BlackBerry Z10 smartphone to customers in the United States with our carrier and retail partners. BlackBerry 10 offers a faster and smarter experience that continuously adapts to your needs. Every feature, every gesture, and every detail is designed to keep you moving.”

The  BlackBerry Z10 smartphone features a 1.5 GHz dual core processor with 2GB of RAM, 16GB of internal storage, and an expandable memory card slot that supports up to 64GB cards. The smartphone also includes the latest enhancements in high density pixel and screen technology to display clear, sharp, and incredibly vivid images. It features a micro HDMI out port for presentations, and advanced sensors such NFC (near field communications) to support mobile payments and the exchange of information with a tap of the smartphone.

Availability
The BlackBerry Z10 is available now for pre-sales to business customers and for pre-registration to consumers with T-Mobile, and is available now for pre-sale from AT&T, Verizon Wireless, and at Best Buy and Best Buy Mobile locations. The BlackBerry Z10 will be available from AT&T, and Best Buy and Best Buy Mobile beginning today, and is expected to be available from Verizon Wireless on March 28, and from T-Mobile by the end of the month. The BlackBerry Z10 is expected to retail for $199.99 with a 2 year contract, however, pricing may vary by carrier.

For more information on the BlackBerry Z10 smartphone, please visit:  http://global.blackberry.com/smartphones/blackberry-z10.html

Highlights of BlackBerry 10

BlackBerry 10 is a robust and reliable platform that is smooth and responsive. It has a modern design and a gesture-based interface that is highly discoverable. It is designed to support, learn, and adapt to the way you work and share with features like:

The ever present BlackBerry® Hub, which is a single place to manage all your conversations whether personal or work email, BBM™ messages, social media updates or notifications, and the ability to “peek” into the BlackBerry Hub from anywhere, so you’re always only one swipe away from what matters to you.
BlackBerry® Flow, where the BlackBerry 10 experience excels by enabling features and apps to flow seamlessly together, helping you complete the task at hand effortlessly and efficiently. For example, you can tap on an attendee listed for a meeting to see their latest tweet or LinkedIn profile. Or tap the thumbnail of a picture you just took to launch the Picture editor and quickly apply a transformation or filter, then instantly share it with your contacts.
A keyboard that understands and adapts to you, that learns what words you use and how you use them, then offers them up to you so you can type faster and more accurately.
BBM (BlackBerry® Messenger), which allows you to share things with the people that matter to you in an instant. BBM in BlackBerry 10 includes voice calling and video chat, and introduces the ability to share your screen with another BlackBerry 10 contact.
BlackBerry® Balance™ technology, which elegantly separates and secures work applications and data from personal content on BlackBerry devices.
Time Shift, an astonishing camera feature that lets you capture a group shot where everyone is smiling with their eyes wide open. Story Maker, which lets you bring a collection of photos and videos together, along with music and effects, to produce an HD movie that you can instantly share.
The new BlackBerry 10 browser, which sets the industry benchmark for HTML5 support on smartphones, is incredibly fast. Scrolling or zooming is fluid and responsive. The browser includes many advanced features, supports multiple tabs, lets you browse sites privately, includes a reader mode, and integrates with the platform for easily sharing content.
BlackBerry® Remember, which combines memos, tasks and much more into a single experience. It helps you organize and manage information you have on your smartphone around projects or ideas, letting you collect content such as websites, emails, photos, documents, and other files, and then like a To-Do list, lets you create tasks, assign due dates, and track your progress. If your BlackBerry 10 smartphone is set up with a work account, your Microsoft® Outlook® Tasks will automatically be wirelessly synced with BlackBerry Remember. If you have configured an Evernote account with your smartphone, BlackBerry Remember will sync Evernote workbooks as well.
BlackBerry® Safeguard technology that helps protect what is important to you, and the business you work for.
Built-in support for Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync® so your BlackBerry Z10 smartphone can be simply connected and managed as other ActiveSync devices in a company, or enabled with BlackBerry® Enterprise Service 10 to gain secure access to work email, “behind the firewall” applications and data, and benefit from other security and enterprise mobility management features.
Today, BlackBerry also announced that the BlackBerry® World™ storefront includes more than 100,000 BlackBerry 10 apps – as well as one of the most robust music and video catalogs in mobile today with most movies coming to the store the same day they are released on DVD. Leading application providers have committed to the platform, and BlackBerry has been working with local partners and developers to bring a variety of applications to the new platform, with several top apps coming to the platform for the U.S. launch of the BlackBerry Z10. Please see today’s release for more info .