Future BlackBerry Smartphones To Be Based on QNX OS

The newly-announced BlackBerry PlayBook tablet will run a version of the QNX operating system, and a high-level executive revealed today that future BlackBerry smartphones will also use this same OS.

A RIM vice president was talking to IntoMobile when he said that QNX will eventually replace the BlackBerry OS. But this won't happen for quite some time -- the plan is to make BlackBerry OS 7 an intermediary step. BlackBerry OS 6 is just now being rolled out, so the full switch is likely a couple of years away.

More about the QNX OS
QNX was developed to perform all of its functions with a set of microkernel, rather than a single kernel. This allows device makers to easily scale down the operating system by leaving out the pieces that aren't needed, or modify it by adding additional pieces.

The version to be used on the BlackBerry PlayBook -- called appropriately the BlackBerry Tablet OS -- supports touchscreens, accelerated 3D graphics, HD video, as well as Adobe Mobile AIR, Adobe Flash, and HTML5.

It is not yet known what the features of the smartphone version will be. 

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