BlackBerry Storm 3 Coming Soon?

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A few weeks ago, a phone was shown off via Indonesian spycam photos as the alleged Storm 3 (shown below) – and then purported to be a Storm 2 refresh. Then, a BlackBerry developer was told that the phone was canceled, a tip that we found highly dubious. Now, a Wall Street financial analyst is reporting that RIM is preparing to ship the Storm 3 in November, following their usual release pattern of releasing a new BlackBerry Storm in Q4 of every year.

The firm in question is Jeffries & Co., and according to them, the Storm 3 coming in November will be “thinner than the iPhone” and, in a shocking move, will not be running BlackBerry OS like the first two Storm phones. Instead, it’ll be running the QNX Neutrinooperating system. That name may be familiar to you. RIM purchased firm QNX this year, and their Neutrino software was recently seen in the unveiled PlayBook BlackBerry tablet from RIM.

The idea of Neutrino on a phone shouldn’t surprise you, RIM executives have made clear that Neutrino will eventually replace BlackBerry OS on the mobile phones. What’s shocking is that RIM just introduced BlackBerry OS 6, which is supposedly be much more optimized for touchscreen devices and shipped on the BlackBerry Torch 9800 – their hybrid touchscreen/keyboard device that is not apart of the Storm series of phones.

Jeffries & Co also says that SurePress won’t be included on this new Storm, another departure from the Storm line. Other rumors for the Storm 3 (not posted by Jeffries & Co, this is just a general recap) include a 3.7-inch screen (despite 3.7-inches being the standard size for the iPhone and most Android phones, the first Storm and Storm 2 both had 3.25-inch screens), a 5MP camera and mobile WiFi hotspot abilities.

Needless to say, this is all unconfirmed from RIM.