First Blackberry Developer Day for Middle East in Dubai

Research In Motion RIM held its first Blackberry Developer Day in the Middle East last week in Dubai. According to the organisers, around 180 people had registered for the free event and turnout appeared to be high, around 100 attendees.

RIM has previously held Blackberry Developer Days in Europe, Africa, Latin America, and US before taking the event to the Middle East. According to RIM, the day is targeting those new to mobile application development as well as experienced developers, and designed to give participants “the tools and know-how to successfully create and market apps on the Blackberry platform.”

The day’s sessions covered a wide range of issues from technical topics about how to develop apps to more business oriented aspects. According to RIM there are over 55 million active Blackberry subscribers worldwide, divided between 565 carriers and distribution partners in 175 countries.

During the day, representatives of RIM said that App World, RIM’s online application store, will come “soon” to the Middle East. App World first opened in early 2009 and offers the easiest mechanism on the Blackberry platform for users to find and install apps. RIM said in Dubai that App World has over 35 million users and that App World sees over 2 million downloads per day.

RIM also talked about its upcoming Playbook tablet platform, saying that it will launch in late” Q1 or early Q2” in the US and shortly thereafter in other parts of the world including the Middle East. Answering a question whether the tablet will support Arabic, RIM said it would, but would not confirm whether that means already from the launch or if that support comes later.

RIM’s Sanyu Kiruluta, Team Lead for Developer Relations, EMEA, who conducted most of the presentations, explained the company’s motivation for supporting Developer Days: “Blackberry penetration in the Middle East, it’s just huge here. We see uptake in other parts of the world but in the Middle East they really seem to love Blackberry. And a Blackberry is amazing for so many things, like the BBM, but when we add apps to the picture it takes it to a whole other level. App World isn’t here yet but we should still start looking at developing apps. We want to be here so developers know that App World is coming.”

“It’s kind of the chicken or the egg. Do we bring App World and there are no apps available for it. So instead let’s get developers ready to make apps so when App World comes they’re ready to go and apps are available for users,” Kiruluta added.

David Ashford, General Manager for AppsArabia, the mobile apps investment arm of Abu Dhabi’s TwoFour54 talked to the gathered audience about AppsArabia and its involvement in supporting regional app development. Ashford said about his participation in the Developer Day: “I’m very interested in learning about all the developer tools coming out. Not that I’m a developer but I need to know what’s available to the developers.”

Concerning the unique characteristics of the Middle East as a market for mobile development in general and for the Blackberry platform in particular, Ashford said that the demographic of the market is different. “If you’ve got an idea for an app you need to think about which market and users that target and figure out what devices those users have and there’s a pretty good penetration of Blackberry devices in a lot of countries in the MENA region and there’s a big opportunity there,” he said.

“What developers need to figure out is what the people with Blackberry devices want and how they can add value to them in terms of what apps they want. If we can add value to them they will pay for it and if they pay for it we’re going to help create a sustainable industry,” Ashford advised.

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