Apps war further fragments market

Apps and application storefronts took centre stage at Congress this year, not least due to App Planet, and a proclamation of 2010 being the "year of the developer" during Tuesday's opening keynote stream. Yet reaction was mixed and some platforms left many questions unanswered. Last year's show exhibited the inevitable rush of vendors and operators alike to replicate Apple's success with 'App Store,' some of which were clearly pushed too soon to market. Announcements this year were yet again a mixed bag. Kick-starting the week was the announcement that at least 24 of the world's largest mobile operators would be combining forces to form the Wholesale Applications Community (WAC), a 'write once, run everywhere' initiative aimed at lowering the developer boundaries to publishing on multiple platforms. The move, backed by vendors including LG, Samsung and Sony Ericsson, also held the support of the operators behind the Joint Innovation Lab (JIL). While the venture appears initially noble, the next 12 months will tell whether the group is stifled by committee design or if the disparate aims of the group can be evolved into a common standard.

Vodafone, meanwhile, separately ramped up its Vodafone 360 platform with the ability for independent developers to publish apps through the JIL developer portal. Again, the ambition to involve the three remaining founders of JIL as well as now the wider WAC is an ambitious goal which for now leaves developers with eight European Vodafone 360 markets to target while core components of the deployment service - such as automated payment - have yet to be established. How, or if, this will tie in with the GSMA's own OneAPI billing, location and messaging framework (currently being tested in Canada) is also yet to be known. The operator cited that 7,000 apps are now available via 360.

Elsewhere, the huge presence of Samsung's bada platform could be felt throughout Hall 8 as well as around the city with a substantial advertising push for Wave, its first bada smartphone. Initial reaction was positive and Samsung made a concerted effort to prove that bada's app selection will complement their existing app store with the launch of a developer fund to the tune of US$2.7 million. Samsung's play was perhaps the most tangible of all the announcements and its strategy - sitting close to Apple and Google's platform-based offerings - will yield the vendor control over its app quality and experience in a similar manner.

Even network vendor Ericsson got in on the act, unveiling a white label app store as a service to mobile operators that will launch with 30,000 apps (some of which will be free). Amongst other announcements, Microsoft won over critics with initial impressions of its Windows Phone 7 Series unveiling, but failed to answer any questions surrounding its developer ecosystem.

With all the talk of cohesion at the show, in reality, the app store landscape looks as fragmented as ever, with almost a need for a 'store of stores' - a view shared by the CTO of Australian operator Telstra. As these initiatives build steam, we fully expect to see consolidation within the operator community while the existing top vendor-led platforms such as Apple's App Store and Google's Android Marketplace will continue to prosper by virtue of their device-focused simplicity and thriving developer communities.

(This article is part of a series of follow-ups on Mobile World Congress 2010 from the GSMA Intelligence team.)