An Appcelerator and IDC survey shows that developers are interested in building apps for the new Amazon Kindle Fire and the Windows Phone platforms.
Appcelerator and industry analyst firm IDC have
announced results of a survey that shows developers are highly interested in
building apps for Amazon's Kindle Fire tablet, with a resurgence of interest in
Microsoft's Windows Phone platform.
Appcelerator, a maker of an integrated
mobile platform for rapidly developing native and HTML5 mobile Web
applications, and IDC conducted a joint survey of 2,160 Appcelerator developers
around the world. The survey findings show that Amazon's new Kindle Fire edged
Samsung Galaxy Tab as the most popular Android tablet in North America, on par
with interest for the iPad prior to its launch in April 2010 and second only to
the Galaxy Tab globally with developers. Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 also
decisively moved ahead of Research In Motion's BlackBerry OS to become the
clear No. 3 mobile operating system behind iOS and Android.
In an interview with eWEEK, Scott Schwarzhoff, vice president
of marketing at Appcelerator, said when surveyed among 15 Android tablets, Amazon's
low-cost, content-rich e-reader was second only to the Samsung Galaxy Tab
globally in developer interest. A regional breakdown shows Amazon edging
Samsung in North America for the top slot. At 49 percent of developers very
interested in North America, the Kindle Fire is just 4 points less than where
interest was in the iPad prior to its launch in April 2010.
"When we saw that so many Android
tablet devices were being announced last year at CES, we said price would be a
key factor for people to get an Android tablet," Schwarzhoff said. "And
price and availability of apps are big for the Kindle Fire."
According to the survey, developers
said they believe Amazon's rich content ecosystem, Appstore, target demographic
and e-commerce integration are the key reasons for interest in the new Kindle
Fire.
However, fragmentation of the Android
platform continues to be a concern for developers. When considering Kindle Fire's
potential drawbacks, fragmentation and lack of features such as camera and
geo-location were the two top concerns cited by developers.
"Amazon has shown exceptional
early success in appealing to developers with the Kindle Fire, showing that
price and differentiation are keys to competing in the crowded Android tablet
space, rather than simply chasing the iPad market," noted Scott Ellison,
vice president of Mobile & Connected Consumer Platforms at IDC, in a
statement.
As the mobile industry advances,
contenders are finding success by securing new footholds and partnerships to
compete against Apple's dominance, Appcelerator said. Amazon announced the
Kindle Fire, a smaller, cheaper Android-based tablet that leverages its large
content library while Microsoft's Window's Phone 7 is building strong European
developer enthusiasm thanks to its Nokia partnership, Schwarzhoff said.
Developers and businesses gave high marks to these moves, which contrast
sharply against BlackBerry OS, BlackBerry's QNX-based PlayBook and webOS, all
of which collapsed in interest with developers this past quarter.
RIM saw developer interest in its
BlackBerry OS phones drop 7 points to 21 percent and interest in its PlayBook
QNX-based tablets drop 6 points to 13 percent.
Darryl K. Taft covers the development tools and developer-related issues beat from his office in Baltimore. He has more than 10 years of experience in the business and is always looking for the next scoop. Taft is a member of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and was named 'one of the most active middleware reporters in the world' by The Middleware Co. He also has his own card in the 'Who's Who in Enterprise Java' deck.
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