Blackberry Playbook to run Android apps?

Blackberry Playbook running Android apps – this is the preposterous sounding news of the day we are picking up from several sources. If true, this will really be huge. Bigger than Nokia releasing a Microsoft phone. Research in Motion (RIM) is contemplating on using a Dalvik virtual machine for its Playbook and future smartphones. Dalvik virtual machine is the same VM which Android uses. Once RIM starts using Dalvik, it is a matter of getting the Android apps to run on Playbook.

Running a virtual machine is not the same as running Android on Blackberry. RIM is looking for a way to run java apps on its new QNX tablet and Dalvik as a proven VM is thought out to be a good choice.

RIM can choose to do things in different ways. It can either collaborate with Google or it can go solo. If RIM goes solo, then it will be up to our hacker community to get some of the Android apps working on RIM. The only thing which separates anyone from iOS or Android is the app ecosystem. The sooner anyone realizes, the better it is.

Developers will now have an extra incentive to code for Android. Popular to its ‘write once run anywhere’ paradigm, now they will get a whole new platform to target. And the new platform isn’t a smaller platform but a leading smartphone maker with a market share comparable to Apple smartphones itself. Let’s hang out and see what happens on this counter. This sounds mighty interesting.

[Source : BGR]