BlackBerry QNX Announces General Availability of QNX SDP 8.0, its Scalable, High-Performance Foundation for Next Generation Automotive and IoT Systems

BlackBerry Limited has announced general availability of its new QNX® Software Development Platform (SDP) 8.0. Combined with the next generation QNX® OS 8.0, the platform delivers a scalable, high-performance real-time operating system available for today’s embedded computing industry.

The fifth generation QNX SDP 8.0 architecture builds on decades of development and a field-proven safe and secure platform, while maintaining its POSIX API to provide an instantly productive environment for both QNX® and Linux® developers. QNX SDP 8.0 adds support for ARM v9 and GCC 12, and delivers near-linear performance scaling with CPU core counts, enabling developers to fully realize the power and opportunities of increasingly advanced processors for generations to come.

The new platform extends the QNX Tool Suite with support for Microsoft Visual Studio Code to complement the Eclipse-based Momentics Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and new command line tools including over 200 Unix utilities. It also provides cloud-enabled OS support for development. Furthermore, QNX OS 8.0, with its advanced microkernel architecture, is designed to support emerging CPU architectures such as RISC-V.

“QNX SDP 8.0 provides the trusted foundation upon which our customers can truly future-proof their products for many years to come,” said John Wall, Senior Vice President and Head of QNX at BlackBerry. “It fundamentally enables embedded software design to support safe, secure and reliable systems in a way that fully harnesses the benefits of CPU advancements way into the future.”

“As a premium smart mobility technology brand, we’re keen to align with the very best development technologies that will future-proof our investment in world-class design, engineering and innovation,” said Jun Tao, Software Senior Director at ZEEKR Intelligent Technology. “Our early access experience with QNX SDP 8.0 has been incredibly positive, enabling us to integrate all areas of development within a single high performance compute environment that sets our vehicle software advancements up for success, today and into the future.”

QNX SDP 8.0 lays the foundation for the entire line of next generation BlackBerry® QNX® portfolio products, including QNX® OS for Safety, QNX® Hypervisor and QNX® Hypervisor for Safety. Customers can seamlessly migrate between the platforms to best suit their specific application requirements.

To learn more about BlackBerry QNX, please visit BlackBerry.QNX.com.

BlackBerry partners with Samsung: joint offering optimised for first responders and front-line workers

Today, every organisation must be prepared to manage critical events, including operational disruptions, infrastructure outages, natural disasters, and pandemics. Organisations are not only challenged to maintain continuity of operations during such events, but also to ensure the care and safety of their employees. Those tasked with managing these events – or those whose job functions take them into dangerous settings – require tools that help them be prepared for all scenarios.

BlackBerry and Samsung, both veterans of keeping critical information flowing and secure, have partnered to address these needs by delivering the BlackBerry® comprehensive CEM (Critical Event Management) solution using rugged Samsung Galaxy® devices. The joint offering is optimised for first responders and front-line workers.

BlackBerry Alert and BlackBerry AtHoc will improve communications and productivity by utilising two programmable keys on the Samsung Galaxy XCover Pro. With a single click, front-line workers can easily access essential features critical to their job and safety. The platforms also leverage device management capabilities through Samsung Knox to allow IT managers to monitor and configure application features on behalf of front-line workers, simplifying deployment and support.

Paired with BlackBerry CEM, the Galaxy XCover Pro is an important new tool for protecting and empowering front-line workers, as well as those tasked with managing critical events in industries where employees are often placed in harm’s way.

Darren Spurgeon, business change manager for Greater Manchester Police, which currently uses BlackBerry’s AtHoc technologies, commented, “With BlackBerry AtHoc, the user experience of cascading reliable incident communications has been significantly improved. A single operator is now able to notify all key responders in less than 10 minutes, at the click of a button.  Collaborations such as this help us in getting time-critical information to the mobile devices carried by Officers, reliably and securely, further supporting the work of emergency response services.”

“For more than a decade, Samsung has provided enterprises with a military-grade device security and management platform, Samsung Knox, to protect secret and confidential information and enable productivity-driven frontline use cases through advanced hardware-level controls,” commented James Pak, Vice President and Head of B2B Partnerships at Mobile Communications Business, Samsung Electronics. “The XCover Pro’s ability to withstand the harshest conditions, coupled with the integration of BlackBerry Alert and AtHoc, ensures employee safety and provides a secure and reliable platform for critical incident management, making it the ideal device for frontline employees.”   

Strong partnership for optimised security

Critical events are not rare, and unfortunately, it often takes a potentially dangerous incident to prompt an organisation to develop plans and processes that will lessen the impact of future events”, said Hans-Peter Bauer, Senior Vice President EMEA at BlackBerry”. “Progressive organisations proactively implement CEM processes for planning, responding, and recovering from incidents, as well as for ensuring employee wellness. Together, BlackBerry and Samsung have created a secure end-to-end platform for managing critical events and keeping workers safe, even in the most demanding environments.”