RIM announced the pricing and launch date for Blackberry Playbook this week. There were rumors that Blackberry Playbook will support Android apps. Now RIM made an official announcement that Blackberry Playbook will support Java and Android apps.
Actually there is no native support, but this would be available through “App players” which is an application run-time environment that runs Blackberry Java and Android 2.3 apps. This would be available this summer on ‘Blackberry App World’.
RIM also announced they would release native Blackberry OS SDK (NDK) for developers to create apps for Playbook with the help of QNX POSIX library and C/C++ application development platform in addition to HTML5, Flash and AIR support. They have also tied up with Ideaworks Labs and Unity Technologies to offer game development engines for the developers to develop games for Blackberry Playbook.
“App Players” and NDK for Blackberry Playbook would be showcased at BlackBerry World in Orlando, Florida on May 3 to 5 of 2011.