(Originally posted on the Inside BlackBerry Developer’s Blog)

More exciting news arrives today from the BlackBerry Partners Fund™ Developer Challenge, announcing the winners of the Best Adobe® Flash® and Adobe® AIR® app competition for the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet! It’s been exciting to see such an array of amazing apps highlighted from all around the world. Thanks to everyone that participated in the competition, and congratulations to these winning developers!

North America:

• Grand Prize Winner: Papa’s Burgeria (Vendor: Flipline IDS LLC)
• First Runners-up: News Catcher (Vendor: XIMAD Inc)
• Second Runners-up: iSpeech Translator (Vendor: iSpeech.org)

Latin America:

• Grand Prize Winner: PaginasAmarillas (Vendor: Carvajal)
• First Runners-up: El Financiero para BlackBerry PlayBook (Vendor: Ironbit SA de CV)
• Second Runners-up: Bubbler! (Vendor: Juan Ignacio Albanesi)

Europe, Middle East, Africa:

• Grand Prize Winner: n-tv Nachrichten PlayBook (Vendor: LINEAS Informationstechnik GmbH)
• First Runners-up: Doodle Blast (Vendor: FlexibleAIR)
• Second Runners-up: SVIT – Ebook Reader with EPUB Support (Vendor: Pronic, Meselina Ponikvar Verhovsek s.p.)

Asia Pacific:

• Grand Prize Winner: Love Indonesia for BlackBerry PlayBook (Vendor: Love Indonesia)
• First Runners-up: StockPulse – Stock and Equity Tracker for BlackBerry PlayBook (Vendor: XLabz Technologies Pvt Ltd)
• Second Runners-up: Abcday (Vendor: Vostrix)

The competition winners take home a share of prizes in a total pool worth over $3 million USD, including BlackBerry smartphones, BlackBerry PlayBook tablets, a BlackBerry App World™ storefront feature, BlackBerry Alliance memberships and more. Be sure to read the full BlackBerry Partners Fund press release to get all the details.

We hope to see you at an upcoming BlackBerry DevCon where these winners will be recognized!

With the BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) v6.0 client now officially launched, we’re excited to announce that the BlackBerry® Partners Fund’s 2011 BlackBerry® Developers Challenge has just opened submissions for the ‘Most Addictive Social App Using the BBM Social Platform’ competition*! You can now test the apps you’ve been creating with the BlackBerry® Messenger SDK against the gold release of the BBM v6.0 client and submit them to the competition. If you haven’t created an app yet that integrates BBM features, you still have time to get to work. Submissions for the BBM competition close September 23rd and we’ve compiled a list of resources to help you get started:

Three-part webcast series: ‘Integrating with the BBM Social Platform, One Step at a Time’

• Step 1: Viral Distribution and the BBM Contact List
• Step 2: User Profile and Custom Profile Box
• Step 3: BBM Chat and Embedding Chat within your App

Blog posts:

• BBM Social Platform – Help Your App Go Viral!

Tools and Resources:

• Visit the BlackBerry Messenger Social platform landing page to download the latest BBM™ SDK and documentation. You can find the BBM v6.0 gold client in the BlackBerry App World™ storefront.
• Twitterview with Research In Motion® (RIM®) development experts on @BlackBerryDev – Tuesday August 2nd at 2:30pm EDT. Bring your BBM questions!

We look forward to seeing your creative ideas come to life through your apps! Submit your app to the ‘Most Addictive Social App Using the BBM Social Platform’ competition today and be among the first to be considered for an incentive prize package (see the terms and conditions). For more information on this year’s BlackBerry Developer Challenge, see http://www.blackberry.com/developers/challenge.

*No purchase necessary. Submission deadline: 11:59PM EST on September 23, 2011. See Terms and Conditions for complete details and restrictions. Void where prohibited.

The BlackBerry® Partners Fund has just announced the launch of the BlackBerry® Developer Challenge for 2011 and has started accepting submissions for the first Competition! This year, there are three Competitions in total. Their purpose is to recognize, reward and celebrate innovation within the BlackBerry developer community. Similar to last year, each Competition will recognize winners in their respective regions, which will give developers the opportunity to stand out from one another with local content and language support.

The three Competitions are as follows:

• Best Adobe Flash/Adobe AIR app for the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet – now accepting submissions – click this link for the Official Rules
• Most innovative BlackBerry® WebWorks™ app on the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet and BlackBerry® 6 (same app or companion app) – begins May 9, 2011
• Most Addictive social app using the BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) Social Platform – beginning later this summer

New this year, in addition to the Competitions, the BlackBerry Partners Fund will be honouring applications in six categories to receive a Recognition Award. The recipients, which will be recognized regionally, will be selected in the following categories:

• Best B2C app developed for a customer by an Agency or ISV
• Most useful enterprise application (all technologies)
• Best website conversion using the BlackBerry WebWorks platform
• Most creative implementation of Super App characteristics
• Top Performers – Most innovative use of Payment Service and/or Advertising Service
• Academic – Most compelling app created by student or faculty

It’s exciting to note that across the three Competitions, there is approximately $3 million US in prizes available to be won. That’s almost double the value of last year’s prizing. This includes the incentive prizes that will be given out to the first 100 submissions in each Competition. Each incentive prize includes a free BlackBerry smartphone and a feature in the BlackBerry App World™ carousel for 1 week! Please click this link for the full terms and conditions.

To find out more details on the BlackBerry Developer Challenge and to submit your apps, visit the BlackBerry Partners Fund website and BlackBerry Developer Zone. I’m very much looking forward to seeing your apps submitted to the Competitions – happy building and good luck!