In a press release made on Wednesday, Blackberry announced that BBM will soon come preinstalled on the LG G Pro Lite from LG Electronics Inc. in markets around the world.
The announcement involves a bundling agreement with LG Electronics involving both standard and virtual preloading (using the LG App Manager). Blackberry confirmed that BBM will also continue to be available as a free download from Android app stores, including Google Play.
“BBM is widely used throughout the Middle East, Africa and Indonesia where smartphone users tend to engage heavily in social networking,” said Kevin Shin, Vice President of Marketing for Asia, the Middle East and CIS countries of LG Electronics Mobile Communications Company. “The LG G Pro Lite offers an optimized BBM experience with its large, high quality display and embedded Stylus Pen.”
“People across the globe are using BBM to connect with each other and the enthusiasm has been phenomenal,” said Andrew Bocking, Executive Vice President for BBM at BlackBerry. “We’re extremely pleased that LG Electronics will help bring their customers a more seamless experience with BBM by preloading the app, starting with the G Pro Lite in key markets.”
BBM is a premier mobile communication service that gives customers privacy, control and immediacy as they chat with their contacts – either one-to-one, in multiple chats or as part of a BBM Group. BBM’s Delivered and Read statuses, as well as message-in-progress notices, keep people engaged and active in their conversations.
Blackberry stated that “The BBM experience will continue to evolve for Android and iPhone users in the coming months, with updates that will include support for BBM Channels, a new service that connects BBM users to communities of shared interests in a very engaging and intimate manner, as well as support for BBM Voice calling and BBM Video calling.
