Does The World Outside iTunes Matter To Social Mobile App Developers?

While the mobile market may be considered extremely competitive, recent news suggests that Apple devices may already have monopolized the space. Apple already owns a significant portion of mobile market thanks to their iPhone and iPod Touch devices -- which are also stealing gaming device market share -- and are expected to sell as much as 30M iPad units in the US and 120M units globally in the next few years, according to a Morgan Stanley analyst. According to Wall Street Journal today, there are two new Apple iPhones coming in the next 6-9 months, and one of them is intended for Verizon's CDMA network. Gaining Verizon as a distributor of iPhones creates a massive new market for Apple, including the U.S. government, which is powered by the company. While GSM is a cellular technology used widely around the world, CDMA is used by Verizon, Sprint and a few others in the USA, Canada, and some East Asian countries. And who knows, maybe we'll see a CDMA version of the iPad rolled out in the next 12 months. This of course means yet more mobile market share for Apple. Not only could this potentially decimate other smartphone manufacturers, but it will also impact platform decisions for mobile application developers. While there are some defections from iPhone to Android or other mobile platforms, if a significant portion of customers are using Apple devices, developers would be forced there. In turn, an Apple-only marketplace would mean other platforms will get less developers only amplifying the continued growth in the company's market share. Add to this the fact that Apple was recently granted numerous social networking patents, including two for the mobile space: iGroups for ad hoc, events-based social network creation, and a cover flow-like way to browse social networking contact profiles visually. These two features on Apple devices alone would improve mobile social networking considerably, and further ensure the likelihood of a future where Apple completely dominates the mobile platform. Are you a mobile apps developer? Do you see a possibility that Apple's iPhone/ iPad SDK might eventually claim the largest slice of the mobile platform, or do you think Google's Android OS will do that? [Other sources: All Things Digital]

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Does The World Outside iTunes Matter To Social Mobile App Developers?

Raj Dash

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