The anticipation is building over the new Blackberry 10 platform and smartphones.

Research In Motion has announced January 30th as the launch date for BB10.

Andrew McLeod, Managing Director of RIM’s Canadian operations, tells 570 News they announced the launch date today so that those who follow the company know that RIM is on target for a first quarter launch.

McLeod adds for RIM it’s about innovating and delivering value. If they do that, everything else will follow, “Whether it’s the wonderful sales figures, revenue and all that good stuff, and then the halo affect for our area. Obviously it’s very important for us to maintain a very strong presence here. We have a wonderful relationship with Kitchener and Waterloo. We want to maintain that going forward and we think we’re doing what we need to do.”

The launch and eventual release date of the new product comes after the Holiday rush, something McLeod says they’re not concerned about, “There’s a number of different competitors in our space that are launching a variety of new products, or have recently launched a variety of new products. It’s a very crowded field in the holiday period. The time we’re launching allows us to receive a lot of attention.”

McLeod adds the response to BB10 has been very positive, “For the last month or so, I’ve been travelling coast to coast and demonstrating the new Blackberry 10 platform to the public. The response is very consistent, people are tremendously excited and energized by this fundamentally new and innovative mobile computing platform.”

On January 30th, RIM will officially launch BlackBerry 10 and will also unveil the first two BlackBerry 10 smartphones.