TCL announces BlackBerry Key2 with 4.5-inch display, keyboard with customizable shortcut key, Snapdragon 660, and two 12MP rear cameras for $649
Chinese electronics company TCL today announced the BlackBerry Key2, priced at $649 USD, $829 CAD, €649, and £579.
Context & Ripple Effects
The Key2 is the second phone in TCL's licensed run at the BlackBerry brand, and it reprices the experiment: the $549 KeyOne launched in 2017 as a mid-range keyboard Android, reached US shelves at Best Buy that May on May 31, and the Key2 now starts at $649 — a $100 step up for a Snapdragon 660, dual 12MP cameras, and a keyboard with a customizable shortcut key.
The pricing matters because it cuts against the strategy BlackBerry's own leadership set: John Chen had already admitted the touch-screen Priv was too expensive and committed to two mid-range Android phones, a line that produced the $300 DTEK50 built on Alcatel hardware. The Key2's $649 tag is TCL testing how far upmarket a keyboard-branded Android can go.
First-order effects
- Blackberry keyboard loyalists face a $649 entry price — $100 above the KeyOne — in exchange for a newer Snapdragon 660 and the brand's first dual-camera setup.
- TCL is now selling the BlackBerry line as a premium niche device rather than the mid-range volume play Chen outlined, putting the $100 price increase itself on trial with this launch.
Second-order effects
- The higher price narrows the gap between the keyboard phone and flagship all-touch Androids, forcing TCL to justify the hardware keyboard as a paid differentiator rather than a budget feature.
- The move pressures the broader BlackBerry-branded portfolio: if the $649 Key2 sells, expect the licensed line to keep drifting upmarket; if it stalls, TCL's mid-range DTEK-style rebrand approach becomes the fallback.
Third-order effects
- If the upmarket drift holds, the BlackBerry brand under TCL settles into a small premium hardware niche sustained by keyboard loyalists — a licensing model whose economics depend on repeated price increases rather than volume.
- The pattern points to legacy mobile brands surviving as licensed niche hardware lines, with the licensor's brand equity — not the manufacturer's scale — setting the price ceiling.
The trend: Licensed legacy phone brands are drifting upmarket from their mid-range relaunch strategies, testing how much loyalists will pay for a physical keyboard.