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BlackBerry Q10 sales have 'hit the ground and died' according to WSJ

BlackBerry Q10 sales have 'hit the ground and died' according to WSJ

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BlackBerry Q10 keyboard (765px)
BlackBerry Q10 keyboard (765px)

BlackBerry's Q10 has been a complete and utter commercial flop, at least according to The Wall Street Journal. In a report painting sales of the QWERTY device as "dismal," the Journal cites carrier executives and US retail sources to back up its narrative that the Q10 isn't performing to expectations. "We saw virtually no demand for the Q10 and eventually returned most to our equipment vendor," said one owner of 16 authorized Verizon Wireless reseller locations. An unnamed high-up at a Canadian carrier makes the situation sound even more bleak. "I think we'd all say that the Q10, the one we all thought was going to be the savior, just hit the ground and died."

"...The one we all thought was going to be the savior, just hit the ground and died."

The Wall Street Journal's examples are anecdotal in nature, but there's little choice in the matter. BlackBerry doesn't break out sales of its individual smartphones; last quarter, the company would only say it had shipped (not sold) 2.7 million BB10 devices in total. Nor are spokespeople at major carriers like Verizon and AT&T willing to comment on how the Q10 is faring. But there are clear signs that things aren't progressing the way Thorsten Heins and his colleagues had hoped.

In July, the company sacked its head of US sales after yet another quarter of discouraging results. Has the Q10 been a colossal failure? The Wall Street Journal stops short of definitively proving as much, but no one's calling the handset a slam dunk either. For BlackBerry's diehard audience — what remains of it, anyway — the draw of a physical keyboard may be getting knocked down by the Q10's small screen and a lacking app ecosystem. We've reached out to BlackBerry for comment and will update this story accordingly.