Research in Motion has confirmed web reports that Vodafone is to offer its mobile phone form-factor Blackberry 7100 - aka 'Charm' - in Europe.

The 7100v is a modified version of the 7100t RIM launched in the US last week, dropping the latter's curves and for a more angular design. However, the core features remain the same, in particular RIM's PIM and email software, and its QWERTY keypad, which puts two alpha characters on each key.

The 120g handset sports a "large, vibrant" colour screen, quad-band GSM/GPRS radio and Bluetooth wireless connectivity. The unit contains 32MB of Flash memory and 4MB of SRAM. It also does polyphonic ringtones.

The 7100v's battery provides over four hours' talk time and over eight days operation on stand by, RIM said.

Vodafone will begin shipping the 7100v next month in the UK, Austria, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Australia and New Zealand. ®

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