Blackberry Curve 8520 launched in India

RIM and Airtel have launched the low-cost BlackBerry Curve 8520 in India. The new BlackBerry Curve 8520 will add to the existing line-up of BlackBerry Curve series phones available in the country.

BlackBerry Curve 8520 photo

The phone is available at all Airtel outlets from August 7, 2009, at a price of Rs 15,990.

Airtel has said that customer analysis and research has showed that there is an untapped segment in India, which wants to be online using wireless internet.

The company wants to draw in this segment by offering the phone at an affordable price along with a new prepaid BlackBerry service plan of Rs 299 per month.

“It has been our commitment to introduce innovative and cutting edge technology to our users and we are delighted to be the first to introduce the new BlackBerry
Curve 8520 Smartphone to all Airtel users at an aggressive price of Rs 15,990,” said Raghunath Mandava, Chief Marketing Officer, Mobile Services, Airtel said.

He also said that the company expects the the BlackBerry Curve 8520 to appeal to young professionals, students and a broad spectrum of retail customers who want features like messaging, social networking, email, music and entertainment from a BlackBerry smartphone.

As far as the features of the phone are concerned, the BlackBerry Curve 8520 comes with a standard QWERTY keypad and Wi-Fi support. The phone measures 109 mm x 60 mm x 13.90 mm and weighs not more than 106 grams.

The company has said that the BlackBerry Curve 8520 will feature a touch-sensitive optical trackpad that allows easy scrolling and selection of menus and items. Users can also press and click the menu or item of their choice.

The BlackBerry Curve 8520 is driven by a 512 MHz CPU and has an inbuilt flash memory of 256 MB. The memory can be expanded up to 16 GB using microSD/SHDC memory cards.

The 2.4-inch screen that has a high resolution 65k color display is a step down, but is worth it considering the price of the phone. The BlackBerry Curve 8520 does not offer the popular GPS and BlackBerry Map feature.

The phone sports a regular 2-mega pixel camera that comes with video recording capabilities and zoom. The 1150 mAhr battery provides 4.5 hours of talk time and 17 days of stand by time.

Other features include voice-activated dialing, Bluetooth support, built-in Wi-Fi and a full HTML web browser that also supports streaming video.

The phone has dedicated media keys that allows users to play and repeat the music of their choice, skip tracks, pause to talk, and mute phone calls with the mute button.

The BlackBerry Curve 8520 allows users to access social networking sites, like Facebook, MySpace, and Flickr, and upload photos and videos.

All the Airtel customers can SMS ‘BB’ to 543210 in order to register their purchase of BlackBerry Curve 8250 and receive further information about the plans offered by them with the handset.