Cingular Wireless announced Research In Motion's BlackBerry Pearl will be on the shelves of select retail stores tomorrow, just in time for the holiday season. T-Mobile was the first to launch the Pearl in September, and sales boosted the company's results in the third quarter. Back in September, Cingular said it was testing the Pearl for release in time of the shopping season. Cingular's key differentiators: push-to-talk capability and TeleNav's GPS-based navigation service. Cingular is selling the device for $200 with a mail-in rebate and two-year contract plus the appropriate voice and data plans. BlackBerry personal plans are as low as $30 per month for unlimited use with a voice plan. One thing T-Mobile has done, however, is allow folks to buy just a data plan for $30 a month for unlimited use and pay for voice on a per-minute basis. That attracts folks who already have a voice contract with someone else. It attracted me, anyway.
To read more about Cingular's introduction of the Pearl:
- take a look at this release