iPhone Developer Program from Apple

Apple’s iPhone Developer Program
Special Edition

March 2008

When I wrote my Inside Mobile column titled “iPhone II: What I Hope it Will Do,” I pointed out that in order for Apple to become a major player in the cell phone market worldwide that they had to allow software developers to build applications for the iPhone. Yesterday, Apple announced the new developer program, called Software 2.0 Beat, for the iPhone that will officially go live in June. Here are the major points and my take on the announcement:

• Apple provides a Software Development Kit (SDK) that is available now for a small charge that provides development tools so that applications for the iPhone can be built and tested. The SDK includes an iPhone emulator and only runs on a Mac (meaning, if you want to develop for the iPhone, you have to do it on a Mac, which isn’t all bad since many developers us a Mac anyway).

• KPCB has designated $100 million for their iFund to help finance start ups that are interested in building applications for the iPhone (and iPod touch).

• All applications, once built, have to be submitted to Apple for approval. They will not approve those that invade privacy or contain pornography.

• Once approved, the application is placed on the App Store that is like an iTunes store but specifically for iPhone applications.

• Apple allows for enterprises to create private App Stores where applications internal to the organization are posted for distribution.

• Microsoft has licensed ActiveSync so the iPhone can work directly with the MS Exchange Server to enable the iPhone to work with corporate email and PIM synchronization where Exchange is installed.

• Cisco has licensed their Virtual Private Network (VPN) platform to allow secure access to enterprise servers.

• Apple takes 30% commission on all sales on the App Store.

Here’s my take on the announcement.

• Lotus will build a client to support Domino/Notes. Lotus has the second largest number of corporate email users behind Microsoft, so Lotus will surely develop and launch a client for Domino/Notes, allowing the iPhone to operate as a secure client in this environment.

• The iFund is not going to have lower standards or investment criteria than any other venture fund. The iFund is still a venture fund like other ones, only focused on the iPhone ecosystem. A friend of mine, Matt Murphy, is the KPCB Partner charge of the fund. With my IDG Ventures affiliation, I look forward to co-funding a deal with them at some point.

• RIM should work out a license for their BlackBerry Connect program with Apple. This would be like the Microsoft ActiveSync license: iPhone users would have a BlackBerry client that would allow the iPhone to easily connect to the BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES). After all, RIM makes a lot of money from selling BES. If a company wants to use the iPhone but have BlackBerry already adopted, then this would make it easy for the enterprise to simply add the iPhone along side their already deployed BlackBerry units.

• Since BlackBerry itself is not an email server but, rather, a conduit to other backend systems, this might be a clever way to allow iPhones to get access to not only Lotus Notes but Novel Groupwise, the third largest email & PIM system.

• Apple’s announcement is great for Google since most of the Google services are outside of Android. Google’s maps will become part of many applications and Google search will be embedded in a number of apps as well.

• This will set up a wonderful war in the marketplace between Google re: Android, Apple re: iPhone, Symbian re: Symbian OS, and Microsoft re: Windows Mobile.

• Although the program is very iPhones-oriented, most applications should work on the iPod touch.

Overall, this is a very well thought-out announcement. While not completely ‘open’ (where anyone could develop an application and publish it), it won’t prevent any reasonable and honest application from being made available to all iPhone users. It’s a solid ecosystem that should end up producing tens of thousands of applications for the iPhone environment.

One interesting byproduct of the development of new applications is the need to make the menu system hierarchical and adaptable so that as users download additional applications, there’s a way to group them and easily find them. “Where does the application go when it’s downloaded?” will have to be well thought out.

The new iPhone application development process is more of Apple maintaining direct control over their ecosystem. Even though they are a ‘walled garden,’ they are making it easy for anyone to play and enjoy the garden and its playground.


Written by:

J. Gerry Purdy, Ph.D.
VP & Chief Analyst
Mobile & Wireless
Frost & Sullivan