Mobile operators partner to simplify–and shake up–app distribution

Canada’s three big wireless operators are joining forces on an application-distribution initiative that could change the online app-store landscape—a move that industry analysts say is designed to win a piece of the Apple Inc. App Store market. “They obviously and understandably want to find a way to get back into the action,” said Iain Grant, head of communications industry consultancy SeaBoard Group. Bell Canada Enterprises Inc., Rogers Communications Inc. and Telus Corp. have partnered with the Global System for Mobile Association (GSMA)—the global wireless association—to launch a commercial pilot in Canada called the OneAPI initiative. The pilot is geared to demonstrate the benefits of standard application programming interfaces (APIs) for mobile networks, the GSMA announced this week. The OneAPI project promotes the use of a common set of APIs for all carriers, allowing application developers to easily access any mobile operator’s network capabilities, such as payment functions, messaging systems and location features. The move is expected to drive out some of the costs associated with developing applications across multiple networks. “If you’re a developer, you have to do custom work for each of the carriers to get access to their messaging infrastructure, their location infrastructure, and the payment infrastructure,” Nauby Jacob, Bell Mobility’s vice-president for user experience and content, said in an interview. The companies, as fierce competitors, set aside their differences for the project, said Ibrahim Gedeon, Telus’s chief technology officer. “It doesn’t make sense unless we have the whole country nailed.” The pilot is expected to begin in March or April, and will run for an unspecified period of time, but long enough for the carriers to assess whether developers and end users are interested. Grant, of the SeaBoard Group, said the project could represent the beginning of an app-store attack from wireless carriers. “My own thoughts centre around the struggles that carriers are having with the trend to handset-based apps stores—your favourite Apple iPhone apps, for example. "Of the 130,000 or so that Apple has on offer, offer no upside to the wireless services provider. To the sidelined carriers, those millions of downloads represent millions that ‘got away.’” But the carriers say this isn’t about taking revenue from Apple, or Research In Motion Ltd., which runs a BlackBerry application store. “Everybody’s making the story out to be a fight with Apple and so on,” Jacob said. “It’s not. Apple’s a fantastic partner for us. It’s not about any one storefront. We are going to make our network capability available to as many people who want to get into the business.” If a bricks-and-mortar retailer wanted to get into online app distribution, “we would absolutely welcome them,” he said. Gedeon said the new format of using multiple storefronts to sell applications may or may not impress the device makers. “I’m going to get a nasty message from my friends at Apple and RIM in a day or so. But when you talk to a lot of the enterprises, they don’t know why they have to pay to put an application on an app store. They spend $100,000 to develop an app. They have to pay to maintain it. They don’t think Apple should make money off it. They’re already making money off the hardware.” Apple and RIM were not available for comment. Grant said the carriers will face challenges. “The deck does seem to be stacked against them, and they haven’t a good track record of cooperation, and there is the issue of vision by committee, rather than the more unified command-and-control environment at Apple or Google, for that matter. So the prognosis, despite the GSMA hype, is not auspicious.” But the carriers seem hopeful. “It’s a model that excites the hell out of us, because it’s changing things,” Gedeon said. But this certainly doesn’t spell a new era of friendship among the carriers. Bell, Telus and Rogers continue to hammer each other in the courts over advertising claims related to their wireless networks. Within the context of the OneAPI project, they don’t always agree. Gedeon said Telus spearheaded the initiative. “We started it. But like anything, you nurture it and you set it free.” But Jacob said, “It was really the three carriers working with the GSMA. I don’t know if one carrier can take credit and say they spearheaded it.” In a another development this week, a group of carriers announced the Wholesale Applications Community, touted as the world’s first open platform for delivering applications to all mobile device users. Backed by 24 big-name carriers such as China Unicom, Deutsche Telecom, and Verizon Wireless, the initiative aims to create a wholesale application market for developers. Jacob acknowledged that there are similarities between the wholesale effort and the Canadian carriers’ OneAPI pilot—but that shouldn’t be a surprise, he said. The GSMA said in a release this week that the wholesale applications initiative will rely on the work that the GSMA has undertaken for OpenAPI. “We’re leading the way,” Jacob said.

Mobile operators partner to simplify–and shake up–app distribution

News | 02/18/2010 11:11 pm EST

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