AT&T will start selling BlackBerry's new PRIV Android-powered smartphone in its retail stores in the United States and online from Friday.

BlackBerry's move to launch an Android phone marks a shift away from its own BlackBerry 10 platform, which failed to regain market share ceded to Apple's iPhone and a slew of Android-powered devices.

BlackBerry new Android phone could be the company’s last attempt at making its devices profitable before ending production. The Canadian company has unveiled several new phones in the two years since Chief Executive Officer John Chen took over, but none has managed to stop hardware sales from falling.

With its share of the global smartphone market at less than 1 percent, BlackBerry has been working to shift its focus to higher-margin software sales. Chen has held onto the phone business, which still accounts for about 40 percent of revenue. Blackberry could stop producing phones within the next year if it doesn’t begin turning a profit, he said at a conference in October.

BlackBerry also closed on Monday the acquisition of rival mobile software provider Good Technology Corp, which it bought for $425 million to boost its ability to help corporate clients manage smartphones running on different operating systems.