Vodafone offers new improved BlackBerry Storm 2 at £30 a month

Monday, 12 October 2009, 12:21

RIM, maker of the must-have executive email gadget the BlackBerry, will this week unveil its second attempt to break into the touchscreen market which has become so dominated by the Apple iPhone.

But the Canadian company, which has teamed up with Vodafone in the UK for the phone, is hoping that the Storm 2 handset will get a more positive critical reaction than the first version that went on sale in last November.

The original BlackBerry Storm was famously blasted by technophile Stephen Fry a diehard Apple fan who told his followers on Twitter that the device was "shockingly bad. I mean embarrassingly awful." He believed that the phone had been rushed out "unfinished" by RIM and it was a view that many other critics came to hold when they got their hands on it. With the BlackBerry Storm 2, which will go on sale in Britain this week, RIM reckons it has solved many of the problems that bedevilled the original device. It has upgraded the touchscreen, which fuelled many complaints in the original device, and made it far more responsive.

The BlackBerry Storm 2 is expected to be available to customers willing to sign up to a long term contract with Vodafone at £30 a month.

At that price it is cheaper than the iPhone and another eagerly awaited touchscreen, the Palm Pre.But the big driver of smartphone take-up is likely to be the fact that Orange has broken O2's two-year exclusive deal with Apple and will be stocking the iPhone in a couple of weeks. Analysts reckon the move could spark a price war, especially as Vodafone will get its hands on the device at the start of 2010.