Photos Of New BlackBerry Touch Leaked Online

A selection of photos of what seems to be the BlackBerry Touch, RIM’s latest full touchscreen smartphone, have been leaked online ahead of its expected launch next month.

Uncovered by Boy Genius Report (BGR), the BlackBerry Touch is expected to replace the BlackBerry Storm product line, which shows relatively unsuccessful touchscreen performance.

Promised as “a thinner, faster and sexier BlackBerry handset,” the Touch will be among the first smartphones to run RIM’s upcoming BlackBerry OS 6.1, which focuses more on cloud-based services such as remote back-ups and the abilities to share contact information and restore devices. However, users may be required to log into the system with a BlackBerry ID.

When rolled out, the handset will be codenamed the ‘Monaco Touch’ in the US and the ‘Monza Touch’ in other parts of the world, according to reports. It is expected to sport a 1.2 GHz processor, 512 MBs of RAM, 8GBs of internal storage, and support for Wi-Fi, 3G, GPS as well as NFC (Near Field Communication) technology for contactless payments and information transfer

BlackBerry Touch supports mobile payments

NFC uses short range high frequency wireless communication technology. It is currently used in payment systems such as London Transport’s Oyster card, with a wider adoption expected throughout 2011 in other devices.

Last month, Stephen Bates, managing director of Research In Motion (RIM) in the UK, announced that the NFC capability will be enabled in “virtually all” of its upcoming mobile products.

“The opportunities are endless,” he said at a Westminster eForum on smartphones, tablets and apps, adding that the mobile payment technology “creates new businesses, new markets and new revenue streams”.

Meanwhile, the BlackBerry Touch will reportedly feature a 3.7-inch touchscreen display and a 5.0-megapixel digital camera. It will also offer 720-pixel high-definition video recording capability and support for micro SD memory expansion.

Besides the BlackBerry Touch, RIM is also expected to unveil three other smartphones in the BlackBerry World conference in May, namely the BlackBerry Bold Touch, the BlackBerry Curve Touch and the BlackBerry Torch 2.

BlackBerry users prefer iPhone and Android

While RIM attempts to regain momentum in the smartphone industry, a brand loyalty survey by research firm Crowd Science has showed that nearly 40 percent of BlackBerry users plan to switch to the iPhone and Android-powered handsets in their next purchase.

“These results show that the restlessness of BlackBerry users with their current brand hasn’t just been driven by the allure of iPhone,” said John Martin, chief executive of Crowd Science. “Rather, BlackBerry as a brand just isn’t garnering the loyalty seen with other mobile operating systems.”

Despite huge sales in the third quarter of last year, RIM’s BlackBerry will face difficulty hanging onto its strong enterprise market share, according to analyst Rob Enderle.

“The corporate market is RIM’s market, and Apple has been closing on the company steadily while RIM has shown little ability to really fight back,” he said in an interview. “RIM either needs to significantly up their game or plan to cede this market to Apple, Google and even Microsoft.”