BlackBerry® Jam Enterprise kicks off next week in Toronto and London. This time around, we’ll be focusing on Enterprise app development. These events differ from the BlackBerry 10 Jam World Tour in that they are geared towards developers looking to create apps for their organization, or for the general business community. Strategy and capability for deploying apps within organizations is also a key theme that we’ll be addressing.

Join us in North America, EMEA, & LATAM across these dates and locations:

North America

October 23 – Toronto, ON, Canada
October 25 – Ottawa, ON, Canada
November 8 – Washington, DC, USA
November 13 – New York, NY, USA
November 28 – Chicago, IL, USA

EMEA

October 23 – London, UK
November 1 – Amsterdam, Netherlands
November 6 – Frankfurt, Germany
November 15 – Madrid, Spain

Latin America

November 6 – São Paulo, Brazil
November 16 – Mexico City, Mexico

As with prior BlackBerry 10 Jam World Tour events, registration is free but space is limited. A number of BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha devices will also be distributed to those that are eligible. So what are you waiting for? Come out to a full day of events dedicated to providing the Enterprise developer community with insights on the upcoming BlackBerry 10 platform: its strengths, the vision, and how Enterprise developers can build apps that deliver real business value.

Sign up today and we’ll see you there!

[ YouTube link for mobile viewing ]

Guest post from Marysia on our EMEA team – Ed.

We recently took a very short break from our mammoth BlackBerry® Jam World Tour to settle in London for two days at Apps World Europe. Now in its third year, Apps World has grown to become one of the leading multi-platform events in the mobile industry, with over 6,000 visitors through the doors over the course of the conference. And BlackBerry was there in force!

During the two days of the event, developers visited our stand in their droves to get a hands-on experience with the latest build of the BlackBerry® 10 software and to learn more about the opportunity with our brand new platform. Our team of developer evangelists were also on hand to give visitors more information about how to port their existing apps over to BlackBerry 10.

After heading to London directly from the BlackBerry Jam Americas event in San Jose, Alec Saunders held a standing-room only presentation on the latest developer updates for BlackBerry 10, including the news that BlackBerry 10 developer tools are now API-complete and that as of October 10, BlackBerry 10 apps can be submitted to the BlackBerry App World™ storefront. He also talked in more detail about our new 10k Reasons to Believe campaign and how this can benefit developers.

It was great to see so many developers keen to hear about the new platform (some of whom shared their thoughts in the video above) and many of whom have already signed up to join us in Amsterdam for BlackBerry Jam Europe in early February 2013. Until then, it’s back on the road with the BlackBerry Jam Tour. See you there!

Following the huge success of the BlackBerry® 10 Jam event in Cape Town, South Africa in July, Research In Motion® (RIM®) held a BlackBerry 10 ‘Mini’ Jam roadshow in Lagos, Nigeria at the CcHub and in Nairobi, Kenya at at the Ole Sereni Hotel in late August.

BlackBerry continues to grow from strength to strength in Africa, and both BlackBerry® 7 OS and BlackBerry 10 represent a massive opportunity for African mobile developers. BlackBerry is the number 1 smartphone vendor in Africa (Canalys Smartphone Data, Q2 2012) and is the top-selling smartphone in South Africa, Nigeria and Egypt. As well as a huge local community, African developers have the opportunity to reach a global audience of over 78 million BlackBerry customers. Africa is in the midst of a smartphone revolution, and BlackBerry is leading the charge, creating huge opportunities for the African mobile development community and students aspiring to new opportunities.

The events, which gave mobile developers a chance to learn more about the unique capabilities of BlackBerry 10, underlined the importance of the African developer community to RIM. Collectively, around 130 developers participated, learning about the BlackBerry 10 experience, architecture and the tools and resources available to create locally relevant apps for the BlackBerry platform. Some attendees were new to mobile development, so the sessions also provided a great opportunity to learn about skills and job opportunities in the African mobile industry.

Waldi Wepener, Regional Director for East, West and Central Africa at Research In Motion, said: “The enthusiasm and excitement at our BlackBerry 10 events in Africa was palpable, especially during the app competitions where we rewarded the winners with some very innovative app ideas. The technology hubs in Kenya and Lagos are a hotbed of talent and we are pleased to support the growing mobile development communities here. Africa is part of a growing list of regions around the world creating apps for our new platform.”

There is already a very established BlackBerry developer community in Africa. In Kenya, Avallain Africa just launched a mobile health app for BlackBerry smartphone users, which allows users to quickly and easily find trusted health information and resources from any location in Kenya. In Nigeria, local developers have designed a number of apps for current BlackBerry models, including the Nigerian Constitution App by Pledge51 for access to important constitutional information; SeeAm, to find the location of all ATMs throughout Nigeria; and the EssentialApp, a free-to-download BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) integrated app that provides a useful guide for entertainment and day-to-day life in Nigeria. (Hear more from Nigerian developers about why they develop for BlackBerry!)

Nigerian developers queue for BlackBerry 10

Some 70 Nigerian developers attended the BlackBerry 10 Mini Jam in Lagos and the excitement about the new BlackBerry 10 platform was plain to see. They were queuing up to share ideas and mingle with other BlackBerry developers.

Delegates choose “Make We Bet” as the most innovative application in a competition, with the creator winning a BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha prototype device for mobile development, and a BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet. William Ukoh (@williamukoh), the creator of “Make We Bet” said: “For years, BlackBerry has been an appealing platform for my colleagues and I. The experience of meeting with my peers and learning more about the BlackBerry platform has been worthwhile.”

Femi Longe, a Co-Founder of the CcHub added: “We were impressed after seeing what BlackBerry 10 has to offer, and we are excited by an even closer look at the platform and its capabilities at the BlackBerry 10 Mini Jam sessions in Lagos. At CcHub, we have strong ties with the developer community and encouraging development is our goal. We’re eager to start using the updated user interface features offered by Cascades™ in BlackBerry 10, and we look forward to enriching the user experience to ensure our BlackBerry-based solutions and applications remain attractive and cutting-edge.”

High interest in Kenya

The BlackBerry 10 Mini Jam developer event in Nairobi drew more than 50 developers. The keen attendance, interest and eager interaction by the developers showed that the Kenyan developer community is excited about and ready for BlackBerry 10.

Developers at the event praised BlackBerry 10 and the Mini Jam event. George Murage, Business Developer and Blogger for Juuchini, said: “The one-on-one expert guidance on creating BlackBerry 10 apps from the RIM team will enable local developers to build better mobile apps in various languages, and more importantly, help build an ecosystem to support Kenyan consumers when BlackBerry 10 launches.”

“I am thrilled the BlackBerry 10 Mini Jam has offered me the opportunity to interact and know more about BlackBerry 10 experience. It has been one of the most inspiring experience and learnings for me,” added Eric Omondi, from the Africa Solidarity Volunteer Foundation.

Grace Kihumba, Business Developer at Strathmore University iLab, said: “The experience has been an eye-opener for me. A few years ago, when I was developing apps for BlackBerry they didn’t have many applications and it’s quite fascinating to see how far they have come with the new platforms. I have been deeply motivated to develop more apps for BlackBerry.”

One of the most exciting recent developments for the Kenyan developer community, the iAfya app, created a lot of buzz at BB10 Mini Jam Kenya. Dr Allan Makenzi, MD of Avallain Africa, attended to talk about the iAfya app and the importance and opportunity for developers in the mobile health sector. He praised BlackBerry for providing a platform that is bringing services such as healthcare information closer to African consumers.

Here’s Dr. Makenzi addressing developers at the Nairobi event:

We can’t wait to see what comes from our Kenyan and Nigerian developer communities in the coming months. To see more of the BlackBerry 10 Mini Jam event in Nigeria, click here and for Kenya, click here.

[ YouTube link for mobile viewing ]

Guest post from Georgina – Ed.

BlackBerry® 10 Jam World Tour arrived in Warsaw on a sunny Tuesday, attracting developers not only from Poland but from all over Europe, including Germany, the Czech Republic, and Italy. About 100 students from the BlackBerry® Academic Programs at Gliwice, Katowice and Bielso-Biala universities were among the 500 registered participants. There are now five universities that have the BlackBerry Academic Program (BAP) as part of their curriculum, which provides resources and training courses for administering and supporting the BlackBerry solution, in addition to developing apps for the BlackBerry platform. This large group of students joined hundreds of Polish developers from around the country to learn about developing for BlackBerry® 10. The event attendees included developers already enjoying success on the BlackBerry platform, such as the creators of Cooklet, a globally popular recipe app for the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet which was awarded best Adobe® AIR® app at BlackBerry World™ 2012.

We are excited by the passion and enthusiasm of the Polish students about BlackBerry 10. David Keane, Senior Country Manager in Poland commented: “The response to BlackBerry 10 in the Polish developer community has been amazing and we are glad that so many students are interested in developing applications for the new platform. We are already very proud of our cooperation with these academic institutions from different parts of Poland and we are looking forward to developing the program further with new partners this year. We believe that among the students participating in BlackBerry 10 Jam, there are future leaders of successful and globally popular apps for BlackBerry.”

The students see BlackBerry 10 as a strong platform that provides them with different tools for creating powerful applications that appeal to local and international audiences. Adam Cholewa, a coordinator of BAP at Gliwice University, explained why they decided to get up at 3 a.m. to attend BlackBerry 10 Jam Warsaw: “We have been running the BlackBerry Academic Program for over one year, enabling our students to not only get resources and support from RIM, but also participate in important events with other developers. In February we attended BlackBerry DevCon in Amsterdam, and today we are in Warsaw. These events give our students a chance to gain knowledge about BlackBerry 10 and learn from developers already creating apps for the BlackBerry platform, providing hands-on experience and important skills for the future.”

The students attending the BlackBerry 10 Jam World Tour event in Poland gave very positive feedback on the event: “The Jam was very successful”, said Olek Sławiński, a student from Silesian Technical University. “During the conference I learned a lot of interesting tips that might be useful in the future, and everything was presented in a clear and understandable way, from the initial state of developing to uploading an application in BlackBerry App World.

“BlackBerry 10 is incredibly interesting, especially because it enables to develop in different ways, such as in Cascades™ and BlackBerry® WebWorks™. When using native SDKs, QT4 is very useful and enables achieving our goals in a simple way. Another thing that I like a lot about BlackBerry 10 is its graphic features – it automatically creates animations linked to particular elements of our application. And in case of any problems, we can always count on the support of the BlackBerry developer community.”

It is difficult to believe, but what these students are most looking forward to is the end of holidays! They want to start the BlackBerry Academic Program in autumn so they can get started on building their apps for BlackBerry 10. Truly inspiring. Thank you, Poland!

The BlackBerry® 10 Jam World Tour arrived in Dubai today, attracting just over 100 developers from across the Middle East region and providing them with the opportunity to learn more about the unique capabilities of the new BlackBerry 10 OS.

Sandeep Saihgal, Managing Director, Middle East at RIM®, said: “We are proud of our strong connections with the talented community of developers in the Middle East region and believe this cooperation will be taken to the next level by the powerful programming tools that BlackBerry 10 offers.”

Mohamed Ali, Co-CEO of developer partner ZeroWire Labs, said: “There is growing excitement in our company for BlackBerry 10. We have already experienced great success with the launch of our BlackBerry apps in this region, and with the growth in demand for Arabic apps and the high penetration of BlackBerry smartphones in the Middle East, we expect BlackBerry 10 to create a significant opportunity for developers.”

Some of the tweets from the day:

Wonderful event @BlackBerry Jam dubai #bb10jam—
Jesse J Ode (@TechCircleDxb) July 10, 2012

Queue of devs waiting to get their hands on the dev BB10 device… #BB10Jam http://t.co/74hhDgXF—
M.Saleh Esmaeili (@dot1ne) July 10, 2012

You can build a more beautiful UI with @BlackBerry 10 Cascades UI elements. #bb10jam #Dubai @BlackBerryDev—
Maher Al Jendasi (@maherj) July 10, 2012

And some additional quotes from developers at the event:

Aman Ali from Insomniac Dev: “BlackBerry10 means everything to me right now! The keyboard and the camera will exceed all other platforms. BlackBerry 10 will be absolutely massive! It’s something I’ve never seen before and I’m really looking forward to develop apps on!”

Kessienda D. Majemiif, Coo FastFindIt Solutions: “I think BlackBerry 10 is the future of user experience. BlackBerry 10 will make development faster and easier. I’m really looking forward to exploring and developing with the BB10 device! It is really going to add prestige to BlackBerry.”

Hamza Nasir, LiveAdmins: “I’ve been a BlackBerry hard-core fan since the inception. It’s not about the software, it’s not about the hardware…it’s the experience you get. BlackBerry10 will give developers a lot to work with. The cascade functionality and camera functionality is state of the art, plus more. I am looking forward to getting my hands on a BlackBerry 10 device!”

Here’s William from our BlackBerry Developer Relations team in EMEA to report on the most recent BlackBerry® 10 Jam tour stop! – Ed.

The London BlackBerry 10 Jam was our largest event to date, attracting developers looking to see what the BlackBerry 10 development tools are capable of. This was another great event to experience, as both the sheer number of developers and their positive attitudes alone were amazing. The venue, Vinopolis (a massive wine bar/conference center home-extension project bunker), was somewhat odd in its complex levels and floors and winding passages, but we didn’t lose one developer all day. They came, they saw, they enjoyed what they saw of BlackBerry 10 – now they want more!

Stephen Bates, Managing Director Europe, kicked off the proceedings with an excellent keynote job that covered all the points effortlessly and gave the day an energetic buzz that kept building after each presentation. Andy Tipton was our MC for the day and kept the flow going on schedule.

Vivek Bhardwaj presented a seamless “Experience of BlackBerry” presentation, generating ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’ from the audience when they saw the demos of the photo correction app and new virtual keyboard UI. Michael Weitzel continued with an animated trek through the BlackBerry 10 architecture and was assisted by Luca Sale on the demo device showing Cascades™. Later, Nick Smith of Marmalade provided his magical demonstrations of games running on both a BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet and BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha device.

Rana and Suavek both introduced what they were going to cover in the afternoon breakouts, and following their brief introductions we stopped for lunch and managed to move the almost 500 developers through the labyrinth to be fed and return for the lightning pitches.

The afternoon split into its native and web tracks, and we repeated the formula of Suavek being assisted by Nick from Marmalade. Yet again, this combination provided a lot of information and excitement. At the end of the day, we’d given out the BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha prototype devices to a delighted audience of both new and established developers.This was another wildly successful day, and I was excited by the developer comments on Twitter®.

We generated a huge level of interest through this one-day event, but don’t take my word for it – take a look at what our developers are saying:

@BlackBerryDev I've already sat down to work on BB10 app today after yesterday's London #BB10Jam! Excited by range of development options!—
Kate Glover (@lifson) June 15, 2012

@Derrickerrol Surprisingly tiring! So much good information and guidance! With #BB10Jam BB are really showing they care about devs – I did!—
Julian Clark (@B1uehoo1igan) June 15, 2012

Yesterday's WebWorks session at #BB10Jam was awesome and even got my 14 year old inspired to create apps. @BlackBerryDev—
DJ Reyes  (@djr3yes) June 15, 2012

@ardiri I did, thanks to all the staff at #BB10Jam today! They sorted out us devs who are keen to get apps out. Appreciate this opportunity.—
Matt (@blackberry_matt) June 14, 2012

@blackberrydev I love using my BlackBerry dev alpha thanks to #BB10Jam thanks —
Ben Smith Bortey (@BensmithB) June 14, 2012

My BlackBerry 10 hands on fun. Pure sweetness! crackberry.com/hands-blackber… #BB10Jam—
James Richardson (@j4mes73) June 14, 2012

Next stop, New York City (sold out!) on Tuesday June 19th.

On June 12th, it was BlackBerry® 10 Jam World Tour stop #5, 300 meters a way from the fabulous Eiffel Tower.

We showed a technically engaged audience of developers what it was like to create apps on our new platform and what a bright future was in store for them all. The day was kicked off by Christophe Lefort, Research In Motion® (RIM®) France Managing Director, and was followed by great technical content presentations. Nick Smith from Marmalade showed how they ported several games over to both the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet and BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha.

There were developers in attendance not just from France, but also coming from overseas. Salma and Sana, both university professors from Tunisia, didn’t want to miss the BlackBerry 10 Jam day in Paris, as they are introducing BlackBerry development in their mobile computing course starting this September.

Lunchtime was a mix of need for food and great conversations, then back in to listen to the apps pitches with amazing energy in the room. There were 13 awesome lightning pitches – all the applications we saw were amazing. The audience voted for Romain Dubuc and his funny fluid innovative game Celluloid. Congratulations Romain!

There was a pretty even-steven split between the web and native tracks in the afternoon sessions. The great audience was completely attentive to what our presenters had to say, with each one trying to out do the other in level of applause.  We also presented guidelines, code snippets and did many live demos.

At the end of the day, we distributed the long awaited BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha devices and enjoyed those happy developer faces. I really enjoyed it being here in France and meeting a lot of new and already known faces. Thank you Paris, and thank you to all the great developers who jammed with us.

Are you a mobile developer in the Middle East? Are you developing mobile apps for the Middle East market? Then this one-of-a-kind opportunity is for you: Don’t miss the upcoming Middle East Summit on Mobile Computing on April 11th & 12th in Dubai, UAE. It’s your chance to learn about the BlackBerry® mobile app development ecosystem and to meet leaders from the industry and academia in this space.

We have planned keynotes, panel sessions and hands-on labs to introduce students and interested developers to the rich universe of the BlackBerry development ecosystem. This conference will have everything from Java® development for BlackBerry® 7 OS to cross-platform development with HTML5. You can also learn how to integrate BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) into your app and considerably increase your downloads. There is also an introduction to BlackBerry native development, the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet and the future BlackBerry® 10 platform.

Check out the program agenda and register today. We hope to see you next week in Dubai!

To wrap up the 2011 BlackBerry® Developer Challenge, Research In Motion® (RIM®) and the BlackBerry Partners Fund have announced the final round of Recognition Award winners at BlackBerry DevCon Europe. Overall, we were very excited to see all the apps that were submitted to the developer challenge from around the world – they showcase the creativity of the BlackBerry developer community and your amazing talents. Keep these great apps coming in 2012 and remember to #BeBold!

Congratulations to these Recognition Award recipients! They receive a package with prizes consisting of tickets to the now sold-out BlackBerry DevCon Europe, a BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet, BlackBerry® smartphones and more.

• Best B2C app developed for a customer by an agency or ISV – Yemeksepeti by tmob
• Most useful enterprise application – MDC Mobile Data Collection by Gulliver
• Best website conversion using the BlackBerry WebWorks platform – Salzburger Nachrichten Mobil by Salzburger Nachrichten
• Most creative implementation of Super App characteristics – InStyle.de by ISEC7
• Top performers – Most innovative use of Payment Service and/or Advertising Service – Bellshare
• Academic – Most compelling app created by a student or faculty member – Polar Slide by Dustyroom

For more information on the BlackBerry developer challenge and to read the press release visit: http://www.blackberrypartnersfund.com/challenge.

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!