Best Buy cuts price of BlackBerry Z10 smartphone to $49.99 - Los Angeles Times
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Best Buy cuts price of BlackBerry Z10 smartphone to $49.99

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Here’s another bad sign for BlackBerry -- but good news if you are in the market for a Z10 smartphone.

Best Buy has dropped the price of the Canadian phone maker’s flagship device. The Z10 is now available from the tech retailer for a smidgen under $50 when bought with a two-year contract for Verizon or AT&T.;

This year BlackBerry has been gunning to return to relevance in the U.S. smartphone market, where it has been trailing rivals Google and Apple.

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At the heart of its turnaround was the new BlackBerry 10 operating system and the Z10 smartphone, which has a full 4.2-inch touchscreen and launched in March.

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The new $49.99 price tag from Best Buy may be a sign that BlackBerry is struggling to sell the phone, whose regular price for AT&T; and Verizon is $200.

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Companies tend to drop prices when products aren’t selling.

That’s what AT&T; did to clear out its inventory of the HTC First, the so-called Facebook phone. After initially launching it at $99 with a two-year contract, AT&T; dropped the phone’s price to 99 cents in order to spur sales.

Tech products also tend to go on sale when a new version of the device is close to launching.

According to a report last month by CNET, BlackBerry is developing a device called the A10 that would succeed the Z10. However, that device isn’t expected to launch until at least November.

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