BlackBerry was supposed to announce new smartphones sometime in 2022, but new information confirms that it won’t happen, and BlackBerry is officially dead. New enterprise-oriented and 5G capable devices were supposed to be introduced this year with dedicated keyboards, but it appears that BlackBerry is officially dead, according to Kevin Michaluk, the founder of CrackBerry.com.

The founder posted on the CrackBerry forum, confirming the news with fans and followers.

“Dead as of yesterday. Time to move on CrackBerry fam. Confirmed from multiple sources. Reminder that I NEVER signed an NDA with them though I was offered one.

We'll see if they actually post a formal update to their blog or not, but my guess would be that John Chen/BlackBerry prefers they just go quietly away (he's clearly done with phones) and at this point its probably best for all of us to forgot about this train wreck. Well, train-wreck is too complimentary as it would imply they built a train that they then wrecked. They never got that far.

The majority of new businesses fail, so don't think it's that shocking of a surprise. I'm sure the people involved set out with good intentions and put in some real effort to make things happen (don't think you would go through the effort and put your names on the line with a plan to fail), but obviously were not able to execute. Just sucks that so many people excited about this were dragged along for so long only to have it end like this.

Again, I never signed an NDA but also can't burn my sources so gotta keep it a little vague at the moment. Am sure with time we'll get some more post-mortem details here... they usually come out once people start talking.”

Michaluk never signed an NDA, hence he was able to share a few key information on the Onward Mobility license with BlackBerry. The news isn’t too surprising, given that BlackBerry sold its patents for $600 million earlier this year. Onward Mobility and BlackBerry announced that a new smartphone could arrive in 2021, but it was delayed multiple times. The new smartphone was allegedly very similar, in terms of design, to the previous BlackBerry Priv, which was released all the way back in 2015.