As the smartphone market gets saturated with expensive models, phone makers are now turning to the lower-end income bracket to boost their sales and profit by releasing handheld units that cost below $200 or $100.

The latest to join this trend is faltering Canadian phonemaker BlackBerry, which said on Monday that it would release to the market in 2014 two new models of smartphones.

BlackBerry CEO John Chen gave a hint of the tech firm's future product launch at the Consumer Electronic Show 2014. Of the two upcoming smartphones, one would have a touchscreen, to be priced below $200, and the other a full QWERTY keyboard.

The touchscreen phone, which targets developing markets, would be made by Foxconn. By focusing on the affordable market, Highlight Press noted that it is a virtual admission by BlackBerry that it could not compete with industry leaders Apple and Samsung in the high-end market.

However, the upcoming QWERTY keyboard phone would be geared toward the higher-income market, Mr Chen said.

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He admitted that BlackBerry had struggled with setbacks in 2013, but the company is not giving up.

"We're not retreating from the consumer business ... For emerging markets, BlackBerry will let Foxconn take a bigger role. But we will do the next set of cool phones," he said.

The return to physical keyboard came on the heels of a lawsuit that BlackBerry filed against Typo, a mobile keyboard startup owned by American Idol host Ryan Seacrest, for allegedly replicating the BlackBerry typing experience on a iPhone via a keyboard-case hybrid accessory.

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There were also speculations last week that Hewlett Packard could release soon a below $200 smartphone with features similar to the Samsung Galaxy Note.

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