Bookings for the Playbook – which was released in the US and Canada on 19th April 2011 but not in India and several other countries – have already commenced and bookings made before 22nd June are eligible for a free leather case and a free HDMI cable for connecting the Playbook to a TV.
RIM has announced that Balckberry Playbook will be released during June 2011 in the markets of 15 other countries: Australia, Columbia, France, Germany, Holland, Indonesia, Italy, Mexico, Netherlands, Singapore, Spain, UAE, UK, Venezuela, and Hong Kong.
“The price is going to be competitive with the other products and in line with the global pricing as well,” the company has stated. The international prices of the Playbook are $499 (16GB), $599 (32GB), and $699 (64GB). Accordingly, the prices are expected to be in the range Rs 22,000 – 32,000.
The Playbook supports only Wifi; as a result, it has to be connected to a Blackberry mobile phone for email etc. Perhaps native GSM support can capture vast markets for the Playbook.
While the sales of Blackberry Playbook are presently lagging behind those of Apple iPad, the scales may well be tipped in favour of the Blackberry eventually because of its support for Flash and for its support of native Facebook applications.
The estimated one million strong user-base that Blackberry has in India could well prove to be the key for the success of Blackberry Playbook in the Indian market.
