It apparently has come to light that the original release date for Research In Motion’s BlackBerry PlayBook tablet was delayed by roughly a month, the reason it appears could have well been down to Apple and the Apple iPad 2.

According to Slash Gear and by way of DigiTimes, touch screen panel sources say that shipments of the BlackBerry PlayBook were postponed for about a month due to Apple hogging up most of the available touch screen panel capacity.

The word is Apple used their financial power to secure most of the available touch screen panels for their iOS tablets leaving very little for rival tablet makers. Whether Apple was aware of the roll on affect their booking of the panels would have is up for debate, but they probably didn’t care anyway.

Apparently Quanta are picking up the pace of shipments to Research In Motion as they see the BlackBerry PlayBook as one of the major tablet orders for the year. Word is Research In Motion is holding a launch event for the BlackBerry PlayBook on the 14th of this month.