In a recent survey conducted by mobile development companies, researchers found that mobile developers prefer to build applications for the Apple iPhone and the Google Android, but lack interest in Microsoft’s Windows Phone.
As The Seattle Times reports, these mobile developers who participated in the survey were “very interested” in developing applications for the iPhone. 91% of developers want to build for the iPhone whereas 86% of developers were very interested in developing for the iPad. Google’s Android operating system sparked an 85% interest while Google’s Android Tablets sparked a 71% interest. Coming in last place is none other than Microsoft’s own, Windows Phone, which 29% of developers said they would be interested in developing applications for the platform.
One of the companies who conducted the survey, Appcelerator, discovered an interesting trend that could be used to Microsoft’s advantage. “Now we’re in the shipping wave of Android tablets. That’s where things start getting experienced. Now we get the first set of reviews, they are coming up with fair to, say, mixed reviews. What we hear from our developer base on this is that Microsoft has a window of opportunity in exploiting the issue that Android tablets are seeing today. The good news is with Android there’s an opening on the tablet and fragmentation. There’s an opportunity to walk the middle line between not being closed like Apple and not being too chaotic like Google.”
We know that the Windows Phone platform is relatively young compared to its rivals, but interest is building. The survey, in which 2,760 developers took part of, revealed that developers are concerned about Microsoft being too far behind Apple and Google. Since most developers are too busy developing applications for Apple and Google, no one has time for Microsoft.
The interesting thing to note is that these developers firmly believe that Microsoft’s partnership with Nokia could be a game-changer. This partnership gives the best chance of competition between Microsoft, Apple, and Google.
The media can also cause a damaging reputation as recently we learned that both Android and iOS store location history, while Microsoft’s Windows Phone does not.
As of March 2011, Microsoft’s Windows Phone platform has a 7% market share while Apple’s iOS comes in at 25% and Google’s Android comes in at a whopping 50% market share. Developers should begin to create more applications for the Windows Phone platform as the platform gets older.
Further reading: Apple, Google, Microsoft, Windows Phone 7
