BlackBerry wants to make an 'iconic' tablet

BlackBerry PlayBook
Will we one day see the PlayBook II?

You may remember the ill-fated PlayBook, the BlackBerry tablet that was supposed to rival the iPad but then sank without a trace in 2011. It would be enough to put anyone off tablets for life - but not, it seems, BlackBerry CEO John Chen.

Chen wasn't at the company for the original Playbook, but in an interview during Mobile World Congress he said he was thinking about a successor to it. "It's not in the works, but it's on my mind," said Chen, as CNET reports.

Put your wallets (or your scorn) away for now, though: it's only going to happen if BlackBerry can get the device right. "I want it to be different. I want it to be iconic," said the CEO. "Bringing a tablet out for a tablet's sake, it's not the right thing to do."

Down to business

The company John Chen heads up is certainly trying as many tricks as it can think of to try and claw back some market share. At MWC we've seen BlackBerry show off its new Leap smartphone - one of several it's going to put out during 2015.

That's in addition to the odd-looking Passport and the back-to-basics Classic we saw come out last year. Perhaps if BlackBerry can get a foothold in phones, it will be able to think about tablets once more.

Even if BlackBerry comes out with the greatest tablet in history, it's going to be a difficult sell: smartphones are getting bigger all the time, and even iPad sales are dipping. It could be business users where tablets finally find their niche, an area BlackBerry has a strong track record in.

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David Nield
Freelance Contributor

Dave is a freelance tech journalist who has been writing about gadgets, apps and the web for more than two decades. Based out of Stockport, England, on TechRadar you'll find him covering news, features and reviews, particularly for phones, tablets and wearables. Working to ensure our breaking news coverage is the best in the business over weekends, David also has bylines at Gizmodo, T3, PopSci and a few other places besides, as well as being many years editing the likes of PC Explorer and The Hardware Handbook.