Cell Phone “Tower of Babel” poses challenges on software designers

News // jul 27 2009

Compera nTime Yavox, which designs software for cell phones, has a database with 2000 possible combinations of operating systems, devices and screens to cope with the multiple arrays of models and the absence of standardization in such segment.

By the way, the company long name is an example of this “Tower of Babel”: it is the juxtaposition of the brand of the companies that got their forces and know-how together in the attempt to fully embrace all the lines of the market.

Differently from the personal computer world, the mobile telephony has no dominant company as it occurs with Microsoft and its operating system, Windows. There’s no standardization for programming, formats and device size platforms. That generates a completely peculiar situation for those companies willing to design applications for cell phones: they are required to invest more time and money in the production of distinct versions of the same software.

It has always been like that. But now telephony carriers and device manufacturers are more and more concerned because cell phones are evolving more complex and more important to gain access to Internet.

Telefónica major executive for Latin America, José María Alvarez-Pallete, stated in a recent interview to Valor the company will have to face such problem sometime in the future. For Michael O’Hara, marketing director of GSM Association (GSMA) — the association of the mobile telephony companies – this issue is also relevant. “We have been creating application islands”, he warned, during a telecommunications event in Sweden.

The base of these “islands” are the several operating systems that can be run in more sophisticated devices: Symbian, from the homonymous company owned by Nokia; RIM OS, from the BlackBerry manufacturer; Windows Mobile, by Microsoft; Android, by Google; Mac OS, by Apple, among others. It’s up for designers to choose one of these paths or pay the price of living on a whole archipelago.

The one who designs contents without any business intent – a game to be shared with friends, for instance – many times selects only the platform compatible with their device. On the other hand, the companies operating in the creation of applications tend to embrace different systems as a way of enhancing their potential business.

Every time consumers ask for an application designed by Compera nTime, the company database is triggered. One system accesses the information and shows the most appropriate version of the software to operate with the user’s device. “Simpler applications usually are equipped with five or six variations. If it is heavier, the number also increases”, Fabrício Bloisi says, the company chief executive.

To cover all the market, the Brazilian Compera started up a consolidation process two years ago:  it acquired nTime, Yavox, and eventually Movile. That’s where the company name comes from, to be replaced by a new brand in September.

Spring Wireless, another domestic company, also designed a system to prevent any double work. “We tried to cover such diversity based on a menu of tools that translate the software into different languages”, Marcelo Condé, the company’s president, stated. “That increases the potential audience”. In order to attract users to their platforms, the large-sized mobile telephone manufacturers promote forums where they share information about the systems they use and provide the so-called software design kits to the interested people.

Additionally these companies have bet on the opening of application stores that bring designers together and operate as a purchase center for users.

Nokia, the largest manufacturer of cell phones in the world, has five million designers registered in its forum. About 90% of them are users interested in creating home-made applications. The other 10% work as professionals. The Sweden company has a team dedicated to manage the relationship with the most important ones.

App Store, by Apple, has 100,000 designers all over the world. RIM relies on 120,000 application designers for its cell phone — BlackBerry. Behind such figures are thousands of software companies — usually small ones — willing to benefit from the mobile telephony expansion in the next years. Cell phones more and more look like PCs, mobile networks capable of transmitting data in high speed and new consumption habits are starting to generate demand for several applications for the devices — ranging from games and work tools to the automation of sale forces.

There is no official data about the Brazilian market. Condé, from Spring Wireless, estimates revenues of about US$ 450 million in the mobile application segment.

The research company Yankee Group projects the  Brazilian cell phone carriers’ turnover at US$ 3.6 billion this year, from their data transmission services. That includes the sale of packages, revenues from application consumption and traffic. This figure can reach US$ 6,3 billion by 2013, says Yankee analyst Júlio Püschel. “The mobility market will be larger than the wireline Internet in the next decade”, Bloisi, from Compera, comments.

Others think this market will grow up more quickly after the deployment of some kind of standardization in the language used by the device manufacturers.

Nonetheless companies have fought fiercely to promote their operating systems, attempting to bite larger market shares.

Nokia plans to open the code of Symbian system next month, designed by one of its controlled companies. “That is going to fuel up the creation of more applications — both simple and complex ones”, Newton Pontes, Nokia business development director, said. Last year Google introduced Android also as open software that has already won followers such as HTC and Motorola.

Jornal Valor Econômico – 07/27/09