How the iPhone SDK is reshaping mobile application development

Eugene Signorini, Andrew Jaquith, and I wrote a Yankee Group Decision Note analyzing the Apple iPhone Software Development Kit (SDK) announcement last week; clients will probably see it in our published research sometime next week. But despite that note being more than 2,000 words, I'm still finding new insights from other writers on the topic. Today's harvest includes some commentary from Michael Mace, who declares that Apple gets it right. Michael's been on my mobile Web Sites interview list because he's an authority on many aspects of the mobile market and business strategy, and I think his comments on the intersection of mobile apps and the iPhone are particularly interesting:

I think it's likely that web apps will eventually displace most native mobile apps, because the addressable market will be so much larger. But eventually can take a long time, and if anyone can buck the trend it'll be Apple. They have created by far the best overall proposition for mobile developers on any platform in the US or Europe, and I hope they'll do very well for a long time.

Apple is challenging the rest of the mobile industry to compete on its terms. It will be very interesting to see how the other mobile vendors react, Nokia and Microsoft in particular. Nokia seems to be focused on a strategic positioning activity around seeing who can collect the most runtimes, while Apple is solving real developer and user problems. It's a striking contrast.

Blogging on the Yankee Group Web site

For those interested in my official Yankee Group comments, I've just started posting on the Yankee Group Blog site (http://blogs.yankeegroup.com). My first post is here. So given that I'll be writing in two places, I'll ask the question of readers: do you want me to cross post my articles here as well, or leave this blog for other topics that don't really fit into the Yankee mold? Leave a comment if you have an opinion on the matter.

Anywhere services need redundancy, not single points of failure

I've got to chime in with Jon Gruber of Daring Fireball on this: No matter how much Research in Motion promotes their NOC approach to running its Blackberry service, it's still a single point of failure for all Blackberry subscribers. And given that this weakness has been demonstrated to Blackberry subscribers with two multi-hour outages in the last 11 months, at some point, businesses are going to scream "Fix it!" I'm surprised someone from the high-availability computing world hasn't pilloried RIM already.

For those who don't think RIM's outages are any big deal, here's a fun fact. If RIM were trying to meet a 99.999% availability for its Blackberry service, the three-hour outage on February 12, 2008 would have used up its allowed downtime for the next 34 years. Oops.

It's easy to forget that until the Internet came along and demonstrated that distributed and decentralized networks really were more reliable, most of the major computer companies built networks with centralized command and control systems, yet those networks never achieved anything like the resilience of the Internet. It's a shame Anywhere business customers using Blackberrys are going to have to learn that lesson again the hard way. It's not a question of if that will happen; it's a question of when.

Meanwhile, everyone who wants to avoid the Anywhere school of hard knocks should repeat after me:

I will not accept single points of failure in my Anywhere service.

I will not accept single points of failure in my Anywhere service.

I will not accept single points of failure in my Anywhere service.

....

Did the iPhone SDK mean Apple will corner the Anywhere device market?

GottaBeMobile.com has an interesting claim that Apple's SDK announcement yesterday may have an unexpected result:

Apple opened a big door with the announcement and shut quite a few others in the process. Apple not only took the UMPC/MID market away, it will own mobile for some time to come, with everyone else playing catch up. The race to the top is over. Now everyone else can scramble to figure out who is number two.

[From GottaBeMobile.com]

So here's how I'm going to gauge whether this is happening or not: track the sales of Asus Eee PC at Amazon. If they fall off a cliff, Apple killed the segment. But given the incredible diversity of developers and users, some of whom have not interest in iPhones or Apple, I suspect they'll do just fine. The key to thinking about Anywhere products is that people have many different requirements for how they will use and buy mobile devices. No one company can meet all those needs, no matter how wonderful the device.

Of course, that doesn't mean that Apple won't make a whole lot of money trying.

Apple knows how to launch a platform

I'm in the midst of writing an analysis piece for Yankee about what Apple's announcement of its iPhone Software Development Kit means for enterprises. But here's the short version:

Apple just showed everyone how to grow a developer ecosystem.

Apple kicked off the announcement by giving enterprises features they had requested to approve iPhone uses in business, including:

• Microsoft ActiveSync built in for secure push email and remote wipe and Exchange integration,
• 802.1x and WPA2 WiFi security,
• Cisco VPN support for secure communication

But then Apple kicked things up a notch with the SDK details, which included:

• Complete integration with Apple's existing developer framework, Xcode,
• Performance analysis tools to make apps run fast on the iPhone
• Access to nearly every API on the device, including OpenGL, multi-touch, WiFi, accelerometers
• A full iPhone simulator to help with debugging.

Just to prove this wasn't hype, Apple gave the SDK to a group of companies for about two weeks to see what they could do with it. Each of those companies created versions of their applications in that time, including Electronic Arts' Spore, Salesforce's Salesforce Automation Epocrates's instant messenger, Epocrates' Drug Identifier, and Sega's Super Monkey Ball. Not bad for two weeks of work.

But the real surprise was Apple's efforts to market and develop an ecosystem for third-party iPhone development. Marketing and distribution terms were:

• All third-party applications will be distributed through a new iPhone AppStore. Developers wishing to do so pay a $99 fee, but can set their own prices for their apps, including free should they choose to do so.
• iTunes will have a part of its store dedicated to third-party apps and promoting the top downloads. Developers get 70% of revenues for paid apps.
• Kleiner Perkins is launching a $100 million iFund to fund iPhone developer companies. That means money shouldn't be a barrier to getting an great third-party iPhone software business off the ground.

Now I know that not everyone will agree with all the details, and I think everyone expected Apple to seed iPhone development with its SDK. But what Apple actually did is till the ground for development with enterprise features, seed it with the SDK, water it with marketing and distribution, and fertilize it with cash. If third-party apps don't grow with that kind of support, nothing will.