Copyright © 2011 Appcelerator, Inc. and IDC. All Rights...


Appcelerator / IDCQ1 2011 Mobile Developer Report

SummaryAppcelerator and IDC surveyed 2,235 Appcelerator Titanium developers from January 10-12, 2011 on perceptions surrounding mobile OS priorities, feature priorities, and mobile development plans in 2011. The survey reveals how new entrants to the tablet market are changing application development priorities and how businesses large and small are accelerating their efforts to build a mobile application strategy to deal with an explosion in apps, mobile devices, operating systems, and capabilities.

This quarter’s report shows that Google has nearly caught up to Apple in smart phone popularity and is closing the gap in tablets. Microsoft and RIM made solid gains through their product line update, while Google TV and Apple TV interest dropped off. As these trends unfold, it is also becoming clear that the days of mobile app experimentation are over. This year, developers and businesses expect to triple their app development efforts and the average developer is now building for four different devices. Meanwhile, a dramatic increase in the integration of geo-location, social, and cloud-connectivity services underscores new focus on sustaining user engagement, while increased plans to integrate advertising and in-app purchase business models points to a new focus on longer-term financial viability over free brand affinity apps.

New Android Tablets to Challenge iPad 2 for Developer Mindshare

With 85 new, primarily Android tablets announced at CES, developers are pushing these devices to the top of their priority list. Headlines from this survey round include:


• Tablet interest spikes across the board: Android Tablet interest jumped 12 points in three months to 74% saying they are ‘very interested’ in developing for these devices. Interest in BlackBerry Playbook nearly doubled from 16% to 28%. iPad rose three points to 87%, while webOS Tablet interest remained flat at 16%.

• With the Android Tablet market set to explode this year and the recent success of Samsung’s Android-based Galaxy Tab, 57% of developers say price will be the most important factor for success, followed by minimized fragmentation (49%) and then Android Honeycomb OS capabilities (33%).

• For Apple, topping the iPad 2 wish list: new camera capabilities, a USB connector, and an improved retina display.

• Android phone interest (87% ‘very interested’) rose 5 points to tie with iPad and close to within 5 points of iPhone (92%). Yet Apple continues to be the number one priority with 10 billion app downloads to date. A common refrain: after iPhone, do I go Android or iPad?

• While Tablets are hot, connected TVs are not. Interest in building mobile apps for connected TVs decreased across the board as Google dialed down its launch plans, TV networks blocked access to their content and developers increasingly focused on tablets. Google TV interest slumped 11 points to 33% while Apple TV dropped 10 points to 30%. Developer interest in other alternatives like Yahoo TV, Boxee, and Roku was also minimal.

• Windows Phone 7 rose 8 points to 36% ‘very interested’ due to a better-than-expected launch. Respondents said that Windows Phone’s improved UI was a critical factor for the increase.

• Amazon’s newly announced Android Appstore shows early promise. While 82% of developers are interested in distributing their apps through the Android Market, 37% are interested in the Amazon Appstore, 13% for Verizon VCAST, and 9% for GetJar.

• Interestingly, developers are about equally as interested in the Mac App Store (39%) as they are Amazon’s new Android Appstore.

2011: The Race to Build a Mobile App Strategy

The proliferation of apps, devices, platforms, and capabilities is causing businesses large and small to race to define a sustainable mobile strategy. This quarter, Appcelerator and IDC introduce a new “Mobile Maturity Model” to identify three phases of mobility adoption shaping up in the enterprise and consumer markets: ‘exploration’, ‘acceleration’, and ‘innovation’.

Last year, most respondents (44%) said they were in the exploration phase of their mobile strategy. A simple app or two – typically on iPhone – and a focus on free brand-affinity apps was standard practice. This year, 55% of respondents said they are now shifting into the ‘acceleration’ phase. This phase is defined by the following trends and mobile strategies:


• On average, each respondent said they plan to develop 6.5 apps this year, up 183% over last year.

• Businesses are increasingly taking a multi-platform approach. On average, respondents said they plan to deploy apps on at least 4 different devices (eg: iPhone, iPad, Android Phone, Android Tablet) this year, up two-fold over 2010.

• Ubiquitous cloud-connectivity: 87% of developers said their apps will connect to a public or private cloud this year, up from only 64% deploying cloud-connected apps last year.

• Always connected, personal, and contextual: in addition to cloud services, integration of social and location services will explode in 2011 and will define the majority of mobile experiences this year. Interest in commerce apps is also on the rise, with PayPal beating Apple as the #1 preferred method for payments.

• Business models are evolving along with these more engaging mobile app experiences. Developers are shifting away from free brand affinity apps and becoming less reliant on $0.99 app sales. Increas-ingly, the focus is on user engagement models such as in-app purchasing and advertising, with mobile commerce on the horizon.

• Outsource goes in-house: the enterprise takes control of its mobile destiny. 81% of respondents said they insource their development, with the majority saying they have an integrated in-house web and mobile team.

These trends are summarized into four perspectives that any business can consider when building a mobile strategy: platform support, customer experience, development skills, and technology architecture. Understanding these perspec-tives will enable a business to maximize the opportunity that mobile offers while minimizing the challenge of proliferation and increasing complexity from the devices, capabilities, and operating systems that are analyzed in this report.


Survey Findings

With so many product launches, new app stores, and a holiday season thrown in for good measure, our first area of focus is understanding how these events affect the broader mobile landscape. How did the news out of CES affect platform priorities? Do developers and businesses see Amazon or the new Mac Store as viable? Is Microsoft the ‘comeback kid’? Here’s a deeper look at these and other trends that are shaping developer perceptions.

After iPhone, do I go Android … or iPad?

This quarter, Android phones equaled iPad in popularity. One of the common questions we get at Appcelerator and IDC is, “after iPhone, should I do an Android app or go iPad?” The answer typically depends on business objectives, but the conundrum is certainly highlighted in this quarter’s results (BTW: our common recommendation for pure market share and design reuse, think Android. For enhancing the experience, go iPad).


A look back at how perceptions have evolved over the past year:

Windows Phone 7 and BlackBerry phones posted solid gains on their new product launches. Compared to webOS tablet and MeeGo device no-shows, these two players remain solidly in the game for developer mindshare.

How about those Android Tablets?

The Android phone vs. iPad question is about to become even more complex as Android tablets enter the scene. Interest in these new devices shot up 12 points to 74%, clearly indicating a tablet showdown in the making. BlackBerry also fared well, nearly doubling the interest in their new device:


With Android tablets clearly on the minds of many developers, we looked at the critical success factors for these new devices from the developer perspective. Surprisingly, it wasn’t Android Honeycomb, Google’s upcoming tablet-focused OS:

Fragmentation has always been at the top of the Android concern list, but price coming out on top of fragmentation and hardware/software capabilities was a surprising finding. We attribute this primarily to the sheer scale of what Android has become to the larger technology industry. From Samsung to Motorola to HTC to LG to Toshiba and countless others, if you add up the market capitalization supporting these new devices and look at the fundamental problem of how these players can truly differentiate, the biggest variable that will have the most impact (at least in the near-term) is price. Developers eye the enticing possibility of a sub-$100 tablet and think mass-consumer opportunity.


What about the iPad 2?

No real surprise on camera support, but we found USB connectivity as number two to be interesting. With support for Airplay to be released to developers in iOS 4.3 and the possibility of a USB connector, the combination makes the iPad 2 much more extensible than before. Think of the iPad in a retail scenario as a point-of-sale device or in the living room as a command console for home entertainment and video games. Better support for 3rd party peripherals and content streaming will be a driving factor in keeping iPad ahead of the competition.

Connected TVs: so promising three months ago


Last quarter, we looked in-depth at Google and Apple’s upcoming connected TVs. There was significant interest in the idea of reaching such a mass market on the same OS. Fast forward three months and this is no longer the case. Our read on the downturn in interest is that this is due to the avalanche of new mobile devices coming into the market. It doesn’t help that Google had some high profile missteps with engineering delays, TV networks blocking content, and TVs controlled with 50+ button remotes.

New app stores spark developer interest

Amazon and Apple have made significant news in the past few months on their new Android and Mac App Stores. Here’s a look at how Amazon’s Appstore compares to Google’s and others:

And here are the findings around developer interest in the Mac App Store:

What’s interesting here is that both Amazon and Apple’s new Mac App Store have about the same interest from develop-ers (high-30’s). This interest level is about the same as Windows Phone 7 and BlackBerry, but lower than initial enthu-siasm for either the iPad last January or Android tablets late last year. In other words, we consider this to be a vote of opportunistic interest. Developers are saying, “I’m interested, but not enough to place a major bet”. As a side note, it’s interesting to see the relatively low marks for carrier app stores (in this case, Verizon). With 10 billion app sales to Apple’s credit, carriers will need to work much harder to show that they can make a significant market for developers than estab-lished commerce veterans Apple and Amazon.


This chart highlights three major trends:

Trend #1: Rapid InnovationLast year, on average, businesses and developers created 2.3 apps per company. This year, that number is 6.5, or a 183% increase in app development. Development lifecycles are becoming important. With so much innovation taking place at the OS and hardware level and app production on the rise, it’s becoming more important than ever to decrease not only time-to-market for an application, but the update cycle time as well.

Trend #2: Cross-Platform OpportunityMore businesses of all sizes are also increasingly going cross-platform, with total devices doubling from two to four (eg: iPhone, Android Phone, iPad, and Android Tablet) per surveyed company. As shown above, Android Tablets, BlackBerry phones, and even Windows Phone 7 are also on the rise.

Trend #3: Ubiquitous Cloud-ConnectivityAs we enter a “Post PC” era, there is a rapid shift toward connecting mobile applications to the cloud. Last year, 64% of businesses said that they connected their applications to the cloud. This year, that number jumps to 87%. Even more interesting is that this increase is not limited to either the private cloud (eg: backend web services) or public cloud (eg: Facebook, Flickr, eg: YouTube), but both private and public cloud services.

More of Everything. Now. The Need to Accelerate Your Mobile App StrategyMore apps, more devices, more operating systems, and more capabilities. Each year, Apple adds about 1,000 new capabilities into iOS. Each year, hundreds of new tablets, phones, and devices in-between make their way into, literally, billions of user hands. BlackBerry is up. Windows is up. Amazon is up. Even the Mac is up. What’s a business to do?

This survey round, we took a deep look at how companies are responding to this explosion in new opportunity. We asked respondents across a range of issues on what they did last year in mobile and how their plans are evolving this year. We broke this analysis down into five parts.

Building a Strategy, Part I: The Shift from the Desktop Web to Cloud-Connected Mobility


What does this mean?

As rapid innovation, app production, support for multiple devices, and cloud connectivity increase, businesses everywhere are shifting their energy away from a 3-tier web model to a distributed application model:

This shift means dealing with several major information architecture issues, including:

(a) Architectural changes from three-tier, browser-based web architecture to multiple device connected public and private cloud orchestration architecture.

(b) Implications of data ownership and security as information moves into the hands of a distributed workforce.

(c) Device management as ownership shifts from employer-liable to employee-liable/provided.

(d) Changes from business logic in the cloud to a mix of business and application logic in the application on multiple devices and data connectivity and logic in the cloud.

(e) Changes to application lifecycle management and the implications on tools, internal systems and skills.

As a result of the challenges in moving from a centralized to decentralized model, it is becoming important to securely deliver new client-side services and data, develop a repeatable strategy for connecting distributed devices to the cloud, and embrace new, uniquely mobile, business models.


Building a Strategy, Part II: A Voracious Appetite for Services as Apps Become More Local and More Social

In addition to cloud-connectivity, the use of a user’s location to set context and their social graph to drive adoption is becoming nearly ubiquitous. As well, the rapid availability and adoption of new mobile services like in-app purchasing, push notifications, and novel uses for the camera like barcode scanning is also increasing the need for a company to respond to the increase in application complexity by finding a flexible way to integrate new capabilities into their mobile applications as they become available.

Building a Strategy, Part III: Beyond the Brand Affinity App

The increase in demand for cloud services, location-based services, and social networking is also altering the business model landscape. Rather than selling a purely content-based application, these apps offer enhanced value based on deeper user engagement that drives additional and sustained usage over time. Concurrently this shift towards continu-ous value delivery to users lays the foundation for developers’ rapidly increasing interest in advertising and in-application purchasing. Developers are now demonstrably shifting into longer-term strategies through enhanced and continuous value delivery which in turn supports advertising, in-app purchasing, and mobile commerce business models. As a result, there will be fewer applications given away for free with “brand loyalty/engagement” objectives without a sense of how app development and support costs will be recovered, and less reliance on apps whose financial business models start and end with the initial app purchase.


Building a Strategy, Part IV: Outsource Goes In-house

To stay ahead of the curve, more and more businesses are moving their application development in-house. Increasingly, integrated web and mobile teams are becoming responsible for a company’s mobile strategy in order to have complete control over campaigns that span websites, Facebook pages, and mobile devices.

The other driver for in-sourcing development is to keep up with the rapid pace of innovation. Since application lifecycles can be as short as a year and the need for updates can be as short as a few days, companies are finding that outsourc-ing is a major headache after version one goes out the door. Short development sprints, internally managed by a team that has complete control over an app lifecycle is becoming more and more necessary to retain competitive differentia-tion, reduce complexity, keep up with the influx in device and service capabilities, and stay on top of the demands for rapid innovation.


Building a Strategy, Part V: Accelerating Through the Mobile Maturity Model

All of these dynamics– from more apps to more platforms to more services to more business models – mean a funda-mental shift is occurring in how businesses build and manage their mobile strategy. To put these trends into perspective and provide a prescriptive way to understand where your business fits, we’ve developed a “Mobile Maturity Model” that shows three levels of adoption: “Exploration”, “Acceleration”, and “Innovation”. We asked developers and businesses to identify where they were in 2010 and where they plan to be in 2011. We then define four different perspectives for view-ing these maturity phases. As seen below, the shift to the “acceleration” phase is well underway:


Platforms “I need my iPhone app” was a common phase in 2010. No more. Cross-platform is mandatory, as is deploying to multiple form factors like tablets. In the third innovation phase, a business is thinking about possibilities across all major platforms and devices.

CustomerThis perspective considers the shift away from simple content-based apps that inform or entertain to more complex and engaging applications that make use of location, social, and cloud services to transactional applications such as mobile commerce. As the customer experience evolves, so does application sophistication, customer expectations, business transformation opportunities, and the underlying business models. Free branded apps and a reliance on purely app store sales give way to advertising, in-application purchasing, and mobile commerce.

PeopleAs shown earlier, there is an increasing shift from outsourcing to in-house development. What starts as a tactical out-sourcing of development “to get an app done fast” quickly turns into a more strategic discussion around competitive advantage, control over a sustainable long-term mobile strategy, and rapid time-to-market considerations.

Technology In order to meet the demand for more apps, new devices, frequent updates, and deeper customer engagement, a business needs to drive down costs, time-to-market, and complexity by developing and leveraging reusable compo-nents. For example, a media company needs to consider how to plug into its content library, backend analytics, video streaming, social connectivity, location-based notifications, and advertising systems in every application it produces. This enormously challenging exercise becomes exponentially harder and more complex for every new application and platform. Ultimately, this results in the need for a cross-platform, fully integrated mobile architecture that spans a company’s entire app portfolio.

Concluding ThoughtsAs important as it is to understand what the mobile trends and priorities are and how they’re evolving, Appcelerator and IDC believe it is even more important to have a long-term, yet flexible mobile strategy in place to deal with the explosion of opportunity that mobile offers. The four perspectives discussed in the mobile maturity model above provide a founda-tion upon which a business can begin planning a well-constructed mobile architecture that stands the test of time.


About the Appcelerator / IDC Q1 2011 Mobile Developer Report

This survey was conducted from January 10-12, 2011. Appcelerator and IDC surveyed 2,235 of over 100,000 developers who use Appcelerator’s Titanium application development platform on their plans, interests and perceptions of the major mobile and tablet OS providers. Developers were individually invited from Appcelerator’s user registration database to complete a web response survey. A raffle for a free Parrot AR Drone was made and only one response per user was allowed. Respondents’ answers were given freely with no incentive or compensation for their participation.

Appcelerator developers represent a uniquely broad spectrum of backgrounds. 32% of respondents classify themselves as independent developers, with the other 68% coming from businesses. Appcelerator has a global audience, with 39% surveyed stating they live in North America, 43% in Europe, and 18% throughout the rest of the world. Note also that Appcelerator developers come from a web development background, so although they build applications with Appcelerator Titanium, they are used to working across multiple platforms.

About AppceleratorAppcelerator is the leading enterprise-grade, cross-platform development solution on the market today, with over 1.5 million developers using its software to power more than 10,000 cloud-connected mobile, desktop, and web applica-tions used by tens of millions of users every day. The company’s flagship offering, Appcelerator Titanium, is the only open source platform to enable fully native, cross-platform development, from a single codebase, at web development speed for these three platforms. Appcelerator’s customers can leverage their existing skills and open, industry standard technologies to decrease time-to-market and development costs, increase customer adoption and revenues, and enjoy greater flexibility and control. For more information, please visit www.appcelerator.com.

About IDCInternational Data Corporation (IDC) is the premier global provider of market intelligence, advisory services, and events for the information technology, telecommunications, and consumer technology markets. IDC helps IT professionals, business executives, and the investment community make fact-based decisions on technology purchases andbusiness strategy. More than 1000 IDC analysts provide global, regional, and local expertise on technology and industry opportunities and trends in over 110 countries worldwide. For more than 46 years, IDC has provided strategic insights to help our clients achieve their key business objectives. IDC is a subsidiary of IDG, the world’s leading technology media, research, and events company. You can learn more about IDC by visiting www.idc.com.

Appcelerator is a registered trademark of Appcelerator Inc. Appcelerator Titanium is a trademark of Appcelerator Inc.International Data Corporation and IDC are registered trademarks of International Data Group, Inc.All other trademarks and copyrights are the property of their respective owners


Report Inquiries: Scott Schwarzhoff VP, Marketing - [email protected]: 650-269-5962

Media Inquiries:Carmen HughesIgnite [email protected]: 650.227.3280 ext. 1Mobile: 650.576.6444

Scott EllisonVP Mobile & Consumer Connected Platforms - [email protected]: 650-350-6440

Michael [email protected]: 508-935-4200

Copyright © 2011 Appcelerator, Inc. and IDC. All Rights...

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