Research In Motion formally announced the BlackBerry Storm2 (model 9520 in Europe and 9550 in North America) today. The new Storm comes with a number of improvements over its predecessor, RIM’s first touchscreen device. The most significant change is the capacitive touchscreen with improved Surepress technology. It also adds Wi-Fi and doubles the onboard memory.
The BlackBerry Storm2 will be powered by Blackberry OS 5. It will come with quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE, single-band (2100MHz) UMTS/HSPA and EV-DO Rev. A connectivity (the latter only on the 9550), a 3.25-inch touchscreen display (480 by 360), 256MB Flash memory and 2GB of internal storage, built-in GPS/A-GPS, 802.11b/g Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR, a 3.2MP camera with auto-focus and flash, a 3.5mm stereo headset jack, a microSDHC card slot, and a 1400 mAh battery. Not surprisingly, it also supports BlackBerry App World.
Vodafone will offer the 9520 model in Europe (first in Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, Spain and the UK with France and Italy to follow later). Look for a Verizon launch of the 9550 in the U.S. sometime soon.