We had already known BlackBerry was planning to have BBM preinstalled on some Android handsets. A news release arrived back in late-November that mentioned how BBM will “soon come preinstalled on a variety of Android based smartphones from leading OEMs.” Well, coming back to the present day and it looks like we have the first of those OEMs.
BlackBerry and LG have gotten together and BBM will soon be included on the LG G Pro Lite. This will be the first handset with BBM preinstalled, and in this case, we are seeing news of a “bundling agreement” that is said to involve both standard and virtual preloading (using the LG App Manager). Rather simply though, if you happen to pick up an LG G Pro Lite — you can expect to see the BBM app.
“The LG G Pro Lite offers an optimized BBM experience with its large, high quality display and embedded Stylus Pen.” said Kevin Shin, Vice President of Marketing for Asia, the Middle East and CIS countries of LG Electronics Mobile Communications Company.
Aside from having BBM on this LG handset, and others in the future – this will not change the current availability. BlackBerry has confirmed that BBM will remain available as a free download from the various Android app stores including Google Play.
While BBM for Android currently offers a fairly complete feature set including the ability to chat with one, or in groups, there is more promised with future updates. According to details coming from this most recent release, BlackBerry has said the “BBM experience will continue to evolve.” Updates overs the next several months are expected to bring support for BBM Channels as well as BBM Voice and Video calling.
SOURCE: BlackBerry
Maybe these smartphones with BBM installed may see the greatest success in Indonesia, Asia’s top userbase of BBM.