Adobe and Sony will provide new Android Apps for Sony Tablet S1 and S2. 

Adobe and Sony announced the ‘Adobe AIR App Challenge Sponsored by Sony’ to drive the creation of innovative Android applications for the two models of “Sony Tablet” and offer developers a chance to win $200,000 in total cash prizes.

Both companies will enable developers to tap into native device capabilities and combine Adobe Flash technology and HTML5 using Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 and the open source Flex framework. With support for Adobe AIR, developers will be able to deliver new application  experiences in addition to thousands of AIR applications already available on Android Market today.

Announced earlier this year, “Sony Tablet” S1 (codename), which is optimized for rich media entertainment and S2 (codename), which is ideal for mobile communication and entertainment – will become available in the global market starting in fall 2011.

“Adobe’s creative tooling brings digital experiences to life on small screens and large, unleashing the imagination of millions of the industry’s best designers and developers on a new breed of devices,” said Hideyuki Furumi, Deputy President VAIO & Mobile Business Group, Consumer Products & Services Group at Sony Corporation. “We are thrilled to empower these cutting edge creatives to be the first to bring innovative content and apps to our “Sony Tablet” devices later this year.”

Developers can use the latest tools including Flash Professional CS 5.5, Adobe Flash Builder 4.5 and the mobile-optimized open source Flex 4.5 framework to create a wide range of powerful applications including media, gaming, and data-driven applications.

“Creative Suite 5.5 and our latest developer tools combined with Sony’s innovative tablets provide content publishers with the ideal platform to deliver great experiences,” said David Wadhwani, senior vice president, Creative and Media Solutions at Adobe. “We are excited about Sony’s sponsorship of the App Challenge, which will recognize the most creative applications our developer community produces.”

The contest will give selected developers pre-release access to “Sony Tablet” prototypes and the latest version of Adobe tools. Contest categories include Entertainment, Lifestyle and Community, Games, Business and Productivity, and Innovation. A panel of Adobe, Sony and third party judges will evaluate application submissions based on quality and performance, innovation and creativity, as well as overall user experience. The contest is open to submissions from the U.S., Japan, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the U.K.

In addition, Sony will be a platinum sponsor of Adobe MAX, Adobe’s annual developer conference, which will kick off in Los Angeles on October 1. Developers, who submit working versions of their applications by September 16 have the opportunity to be selected as a MAX Showcase App, win a full MAX conference pass and more.

Developers can easily build AIR applications with Adobe tools and deploy them as native applications via the Android Market. Adobe AIR enables rich application experiences through tight device integration, including support for camera, video, microphone, multi-touch and more.

As part of the collaboration, Sony will pre-install Adobe Flash Player on “Sony Tablet” devices enabling a complete Web browsing experience that includes an array of videos, games and other rich content. Users are expected to experience performance gains on Sony’s high performance Web browser when compared with the native Android browser.