I’m happy to announce the official launch of a contest for EU residents: The Adobe Mobile Challenge. Adobe are challenging you to build a great AIR app and publish it into the Apple Store, the Android Marketplace and  the BlackBerry App World for a chance to win a trip to Adobe MAX in Los Angeles, California this October. The first prize includes a flight, hotel accommodation and entry to Adobe MAX. Runner up prizes include Creative Suite 5.5 and Flash Builder Premium 4.5.1.

This is your chance to show us and the world what you can do. Using AS3 or Adobe Flex you can now develop advanced mobile applications and run them on iOS, Android and on the BlackBerry PlayBook. So what are you waiting for? Get coding. That said, you don’t have to build a new or exclusive application for this contest; if you’ve already published an application, feel free to submit it.

This challenge is managed by Adobe Europe, that’s why the competition is open to EU residents only :Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden & United Kingdom.

The submissions end on the 1st of September. Then the members of the jury will elect the best applications.You just need to develop an AIR mobile application with or without the Flex framework. It can be a game, a pure artistic experience, a lifestyle application, or even a productivity application… there’s no restriction except that it be a useful and interesting app. If you have already developed an application, you can submit that as well. You are not forced to create a new exclusive AIR application for this challenge.

Visit the dedicated website of this contest to discover its rules, the prizes and members of the jury: www.adobemobilechallenge.com

Michael Chaize

You already know that you can use Flex 4.5 and Flash Builder 4.5 to build applications for Android and BlackBerry Tablet OS devices. Today we’re releasing an update to Flash Builder that will enable the exact same workflow to build iOS apps. You’ve probably see us demo this a million times already but today it’s here for you to start building your applications!

In this video I’m showing you have easy it is to do this and where to get all the developer and device certificates from.

The coolest thing is that you can now use the exact same code to build apps for Android, BlackBerry Tablet OS and iOS devices in one go! When you’re app is ready you only need to press the release build button to package your application for all these platforms.

“But my application won’t look native, Serge“. Well… I kinda like that. Flex gives you the freedom to make your application look however you want. But if you really need that native iOS feel then check out this Flex theme.

Want to find out more about Flash Builder 4.5? Then don’t forget to sign up for our Developer Week. It starts today and tomorrow I’ll be talking about mobile application development using Flex and Flash Builder 4.5.1.

If you already have Flash Builder 4.5 then go to the HELP menu and select SEARCH FOR FLASH BUILDER UPDATES to download the 4.5.1 update. If you haven’t upgraded to Flash Builder 4.5 yet then try it for 60 days. I guarantee you’ll love it. Oh… And yes… The iOS workflow also works on Windows!

We all know that the device market is changing rapidly. We also know that Android is rapidly gaining market share but this video is still pretty amazing to see. It visualizes Android device activations from October 2008 until now.

(Hat tip AndroidCentral)

Mobile World Congress kicked off in Barcelona today and Adobe announced some amazing numbers. Developers and content publishers can now deploy Adobe AIR applications to more than 84 million smartphones and tablets running Android and iOS. Thousands of applications have been created and made available on Android Market and Apple’s App Store to date. By the end of 2011, Adobe expects more than 200 million smartphones and tablets to support Adobe AIR applications.

More than 20 million smartphones were shipped or upgraded with Flash Player 10.1 on over 35 certified devices in the first six months following the launch. For 2011, we’re expecting Flash Player to be supported on more than 132 million units worldwide. More than 50 tablets are expected to support Flash Player this year alone.

I’m really proud of what Adobe has achieved in such a short amount of time. This is my third year at MWC and we were actually talking about the things we’ve been showing at the show the last couple of years. It’s pretty amazing to see where we are today and to see the momentum in the market.

For more info check out http://adobe.ly/FlashMWC2011

Flash on!

Rob Ford (the man behind the one of the industry’s most coveted web awards site TheFWA.com) started an interesting discussion on LinkedIn this morning. With all the exciting announcements coming out of CES (blog post with my favorites coming later today) he asks if the iPhone and iPad will be left in a wilderness and possibly be the only devices not to support Flash?

Rob Ford: “Tablets look set to hog the headlines at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Industry watchers expect 100 or more of the portable gadgets to be shown off at the four-day technology extravaganza.”

It seems that one key feature people look for with a new tablet is the ability to run Flash, I know I certainly do.

It also seems that every tablet coming to the market does.

So, will the iPhone and iPad be left in a wilderness and possibly be the only devices not to support Flash?

Flash on mobile is still incredibly new and we are still waiting to see exciting new mobile optimised content. We are pretty much back at Flash 2/3 in terms of the web. To illustrate that point, look at these old Flash sites on your Flash enabled smartphone or tablet, they all work perfectly:

Gabocorp http://www.thefwa.com/flash10/1996_7.html 1997

EYE4U http://www.eye4u.com/home/ 1998

NRG.be http://www.nrg.be/archived/flash.php 1998

Matinee http://www.matinee.co.uk/site2/fr_nmd.htm 1998

Who’s We Studios http://www.whoswestudios.com/flashsite.html 2002

tokyoplastic http://www.tokyoplastic.com/tokyoplastic1.swf 2003

Agencies are definitely working with Flash and AIR for mobile as we speak.

The iPhone is my most used device but I miss the lack of Flash. A friend of mine who is outside of this industry recently told me the only time he fires up his laptop is when he tries to access a site on his iPhone that requires Flash.

I am still looking at tablets but will only buy one that does support Flash.

I also feel the app store is a “boys club” network, especially after publishing an iPhone app for FWA Photo. It was a long and painful process and aftersales was useless. I prefer the freedom the web gave us and hate to see it taken away.

I believe that 2011 will see many of us moving away from the need for Flash on Apple’s devices. All that energy wasted on trying to change Apple’s stance is better focused on getting creative on devices that work.

I don’t want to hijack Rob’s discussion so I closed the comments on this post. You can share your thoughts on Rob’s LinkedIn discussion thread.