Windows 10 might run on BlackBerry devices by 2016

Rumors of a possible buy-out of Canadian phone manufacturer BlackBerry, are no surprise, as the company has been scaling down considerably, reducing its hiring effort to mostly sales personnel.

Interested parties, including Lenovo, Huawei and even Xiaomi, have expressed interest in acquiring BlackBerry to leverage their positions in the mobile market.

It’s not the first time that Microsoft is rumored to want to place a bid, and the chances of Microsoft’s showing serious interest for BlackBerry have increased, in consideration of the recent Windows Mobile brand refresh (or reboot).

The decline of BlackBerry as the leader in smartphone technology took a historical turn into a downward spiral to oblivion, since the company underestimated the iPhone in 2007, and continued to do so, while iOS and Android grew steadily, focusing their efforts all the way up to today’s trends.

BlackBerry’s fiscal fourth quarter of 2014, topped at a mere 1.6 million units sold, which, compared to Apple’s 74.5 million units, sounds like yet another nail in BlackBerry’s coffin.

Microsoft BlackBerry? Unlikely.

A future of Windows Mobile-powered BlackBerry phones, assuming that much of the original branding will be retained, could amplify Microsoft’s presence in the smartphone industry. The benefits, however, are expected to provide merely a temporary boost to the Windows Mobile brand, while the market keeps shifting towards radically different smartphone devices with desktop-like features, for which Microsoft has already begun planning.

By the same token, it’s unlikely that Microsoft will use any of the technology or design provided by BlackBerry, as it exists today, so there will be no physical keyboard integration in phones running Windows Mobile, whether they carry any sign of the BlackBerry branding or not.