RIM slashes minimum app price on BlackBerry World

Fresh from announcing the addition of video and music content to its BlackBerry World app store last week, RIM has revealed new pricing for the content on the store. In a move clearly designed with a view to compete at a price level with rival app stores, the Canadian company has cut the minimum cost of apps by up to 25 percent, depending on the currency.

UK and Europe will see the first round of changes. The lowest cost in the United Kingdom will drop from £1.00 to £0.75. In Europe, the pricing varies between countries. France. for example, will see the minimum price drop from €0.99 to €0.89. Revised dollar rates for the US store, which has a current minimum of $0.99, and other currencies will be revealed soon, according to the BlackBerry Dev Blog.

BlackBerry 10 is expected to launch with nearly 100k apps

The blog states, “This price tier update includes updated currency exchange rates and VAT requirements. These updates will help to position your content items to be more competitive and attractive to customers in the UK and Eurozone markets. The goal of this adjustment is to ensure prices are in line with currency fluctuations and ensure content within BlackBerry World is competitive.”

The new pricing will begin rolling out to owners of all BlackBerry devices. January looks to be a frenetic month for RIM as it looks to put all the limelight on a renewed smartphone approach. Nearly 100,000 apps are expected to launch with the new BlackBerry 10 range of devices at the company's launch event on January 30.

RIM had held Port-A-Thon events in various cities, where developers were encouraged to port games and content from competing operating systems to BlackBerry 10. More than 19,000 apps were submitted at the most recent event and RIM extended the deadline for its developer programmes due to heavy demand.

With the addition of multimedia content to the BlackBerry World, the price cut is an interesting strategy to attract more developer interest as well as luring early adopters to the BB10 platform.