Can Blackberry’s first Android turn its fortunes in Australia?

It’s easy to see where things started going downhill for Blackberry, the Canadian OEM whose devices had at one point become the generic term for the things we now call smartphones.

Apple's iPhone blew its competitors out of the water in 2007. If you weren’t a fan of Apple, Google's Android arrived soon after to pick up the slack. Since the mobile revolution, there’s been very little room for Blackberry to gain back any market share.

According to Gartner, Blackberry is fourth in terms of sales of operating systems behind Android, iOS and – the distant third – Windows Phone. Blackberry’s hardware sales have dropped so far that Gartner no longer tracks them.

Even more detrimental to Blackberry is that it struggles to get a word in edgeways about what it does better than its competitors, such as security. With every new Blackberry release, the same question is asked: “Hey, remember Blackberry?”

This week, the phone maker announced the availability of its first Android smartphone, the Blackberry Priv, in the Australian market. While ‘Blackberry’s first Android’ should be enough to prick up your ears, what the Priv says about the company’s direction might be the more interesting angle.

According to Blackberry Australia managing director Matthew Ball: “Blackberry is a software company that just happens to make devices.”

That might sound contradictory for an OEM that just released a handset running someone else’s operating system, but Blackberry has gone out of its way to implement its security features on a software and hardware level that’s exclusive to its own devices.

Blackberry Priv is fitted with 2560x1440 resolution curved screen measuring at 5.4 inches. One of the most notable features is also a throwback to smartphones of the past – a physical slideout keyboard.

Under the hood, it’s powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 808 processor, 32GB storage and support for micro SD cards up to 2TB. Blackberry has injected encryption keys underneath Android for added security.

[Read more: Blackberry Priv review]

The Priv also has access to the entire range of apps on Google’s Play Store (enterprise administrators can manage which apps are available to an organisation's users).

The new DTEK app that comes with the Priv is Blackberry’s way of bridging the gap between enterprise and consumer security. The app gives the device a security rating and its simple interface suggests ways to remove vulnerabilities. Blackberry isn’t making this app available to other Android devices.

Taking an each-way bet on enterprise and consumer markets might be a smart idea. Blackberry made it clear that enterprise is still the core market – local boss Matthew Ball predicted the customer base to split between 85 percent enterprise and 15 percent consumer.

Blackberry has its bases covered when it comes to enterprise sales. It’s partnering with Optus to sell the device to Optus Business customers for $995, or on a range of post-paid plans from $67 to $100.

It’s still difficult for customers to get access to try the phone as they’re only sold online. Blackberry is relying on brand value and curiosity alone to sell the Priv.