A senior director at Microsoft, Todd Brix, told Bloomberg's Businessweek that the company is offering financial incentives, including income guarantees, and free tools and test phones to get developers on board.
Momentum Is with Apple
It's not uncommon for software and hardware companies to solicit developers, and most offer development kits, but developers are usually paid from the proceeds of downloaded apps once they are approved for marketplaces such as Apple's App Store and Google's Android Market.
Apple is by far the king of the app market with more than 225,000 apps, while Google's Android offerings recently reached 65,000. Microsoft has a meager 246, Businessweek reported. Both Apple and Google are seeing growth in the smartphone market while Microsoft saw its handsets dip. A Nielsen study of the first quarter found that Microsoft lost two percent while Apple and Google each gained two percent.
After its youth-oriented Kin phones failed and it suspended sales of the once-popular Sidekick line inherited from subsidiary Danger, Microsoft will need to ramp up the user experience in its newcomers.
"They may get some [developers], but the momentum is clearly in Apple's and Android's court, especially in the mobile space," said wireless analyst Kirk Parsons of J.D. Power and Associates.
He noted that the struggle for Microsoft is to show that its smartphone OS is not just a miniaturized version of Windows for PCs. "Until Microsoft has a viable OS platform, it's not going to attract the volume of talent needed to make a serious dent in the apps space," Parsons added.
Souring on Apple?
Jeff Burstein, program manager of Florida-based Mobile Application, sees Microsoft caught in a Catch-22 cycle of not having enough users and thus drawing little interest for applications, which perpetuates the low adoption rate.
Nevertheless, he said, the difficulty many developers face in getting products approved for Apple's closed-source App Store (with some occasionally being removed after approval) can create an opening for competitors.
"My sense is that the developer community would rather focus their efforts on channels that are easier to enter and navigate, but are forced to take the more difficult path due to users' device preferences," said Burstein. "Once device-adoption percentages move away from Apple, developers are likely to focus efforts on creating products for other platforms. This has the potential to snowball for Apple, resulting in an ever-decreasing market share."
