BlackBerry World 2011: 9900 and 9930 launched, Facebook and video chat coming to PlayBook in May

By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

More BlackBerry news is coming from BlackBerry World 2011, the RIM-focused developer conference being held this week in Orlando, Florida. Among the more notable announcements were a Facebook app and a video conferencing app native to the PlayBook which are coming in May. RIM also announced the BlackBerry Bold 9900 and 9930 smartphones and BlackBerry OS 7. Hit jump for a full list of early announcements from the event.

 ·         Two New BlackBerry Bold™ Smartphones and BlackBerry 7 OS -- RIM unveiled two new BlackBerry® Bold™ smartphones. The new BlackBerry Bold 9900 and 9930 smartphones are the thinnest and most powerful BlackBerry smartphones yet -- featuring the renowned BlackBerry keyboard together with a brilliant touch screen and the new BlackBerry 7 OS. 

·         BlackBerry PlayBook Video Chat -- The PlayBook video chat application is an easy and fun way for PlayBook users to make, take and share video calls with their friends and family over an internet connected Wi-Fi® network.

·         Facebook for BlackBerry PlayBook -- This new application provides the most popular features of Facebook optimized for the 7" high resolution, multi-touch LCD display of the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet.

·         Multi-platform BlackBerry Enterprise Solution (BES) --  This solution will make available the market-leading management, security and controls of BES and BES Express for BlackBerry smartphones and PlayBook and is expected to incorporate secure device management for Android and iOS based devices and tablets, all managed from a single web-based console.

·         BlackBerry Mobile Voice System (MVS) 5 -- BlackBerry MVS 5 brings together the desk phone and smartphone, and RIM announced plans to make it available to more corporate phone systems and unified communications applications.

·         BlackBerry Balance™ technology -- RIM is advancing work-life balance on BlackBerry smartphones with BlackBerry Balance™ – new technology that makes possible the convenience of using a single BlackBerry smartphone for both work and personal purposes without compromising the security of company content and the privacy of personal content.

The Bold 9900's design is reminiscent of the hugely popular BlackBerry Bold 9000 which had a tragically problematic trackball but was considered a high point of smartphone design because of its size, excellent keyboard and phenomenal build quality.

Considered the businessman's ideal Blackberry, the original 9000's popularity and the fact that a lot of users wont upgrade to a newer model because they love it so much might have prodded RIM to push out this new version.

The new 9900 is thinner, retains a similar form factor and keyboard but now integrates a touchpad.

The 9900 is also faster with a 1.2GHz processor and  is slimmer with at0.5 mm.

The 9900's  2.8" capacitive Liquid Graphics touch screen brings touch to the Bold line.