PavingWays

As you can see in our Widget and App Store Wiki, a lot of phone manufacturers and operators have already joined the mobile applications battle or are planning their move in this direction. To promote their platforms and app stores and to attract new developers many of them have started competitions, usually with nice prizes to be won.

Have a look at the following currently ongoing competitions:

1. NAVTEQ Global LBS Challenge
   PRIZE: global prize pool currently at $8.2 million USD in cash and licenses
   DEADLINE: November 6, 2009 (EMEA region)

   The NAVTEQ Global LBS Challenge is focused on driving the development and visibility of innovative location-based solutions (LBS) for wireless devices. From business applications to sports, travel and security, integrating the accuracy and richness of NAVTEQ digital map data facilitates the discovery of the next wave of LBS using dynamic positioning technology. Winners are chosen by a panel of distinguished judges in each of five regions (EMEA, India, South America, North America, APAC).

   Registration for the LBS Challenge, EMEA Region has been extended to November 6, 2009.  A completed solution is not required at the time of  registration. The winners of the EMEA Region will be announced on February 14, 2010 prior to Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The global prize pool for this year’s competition is currently at $8.2 million USD in cash and licenses.

   Read more: NAVTEQ Global LBS Challenge (more…)

Handset makers Research in Motion (RIM), LG Electronics, Sharp and Samsung Electronics have joined the Joint Innovation Lab (JIL) and will support JIL widget specification in future mobile handsets from Q1 2010.

“The decision of LG, RIM, Samsung and Sharp to incorporate the JIL widget specifications in their future product roadmap is proof of the tremendous potential that JIL offers both to developers and customers,” said Peters Suh, JIL CEO. “All four companies are innovation leaders and this is another strong affirmation of both JIL strategy and its robust technical specifications.” (Verizon Wireless)

Other members of the JIL include Verizon Wireless, Vodafone, China Mobile and Softbank (Japan) who are claiming to be able to reach a combined user base of more than 1 billion around the world (North America, Europe, Asia and Africa). (more…)

At the IAA in Frankfurt (Frankfurt Motor Show) in September 2009 BMW, Nokia and Parrot SA unveiled plans for bringing smart phone applications to cars.

“For software developers, this opens a whole new domain to sell their apps. For car makers, apps provide new ways to deliver infotainment and telematics services to customers. For motorists, apps allow them to enjoy their infotainment systems to the fullest, while paying only for the applications they want, thus saving them money. With apps so critical to the automotive market, companies are pushing approaches that benefit their specific goals. While the solutions shown at IAA were only concepts, they clearly reflect what will soon be on the market.” said Kevin Hamlin, analyst for automotive electronics at iSuppli Corp.

Sounds good? Yes. Where’s the catch? Doing it right!

(more…)

As mentioned earlier, I was invited for a panel discussion at the Frankfurt Book Fair on Wednesday. The other panelists were Suzanne Koranyi-Esser (Editorial Director of Reader’s Digest Germany, Switzerland, Austria) and Patrik Jaros (star chef, cookbook author, CEO of FOODLOOK Studio GmbH). Siobhan O`Leary (literary agent, translator and writer) was moderating this panel. Good job everyone!

The panel discussion was quite interesting and some publishers are already playing around with mobile applications. Patrik Jaros mentioned that he released a couple of cooking applications for different mobile platforms (iPhone, Blackberry, Android). Reader’s Digest has also an iPhone app available for download called “allrecipes.com DinnerSpinner” and it is related to RD’s online community of hobby cooks (German version). The discussion was not about mobile exclusively, but digital in general. Questions ranged from “Should the content in an application be released for free or not?”, “Is the classic cookbook dead?” to “What kind of strategy should publishers and retailers follow in the digital/mobile space?”. (more…)

Yesterday we went to the Webmontag in Frankfurt. It took off at 7 pm and was pretty well attended (>100 people). First there were some presentations about Barcamps in general, Conceptual Designers, PR & social media, Wikis for agencys and companies and why todolists fail. I really liked the twitter wall even though the filter only worked for the hashtag #Webmontag and not for #wmfra.

1.5 hours later the networking part started. Nice people, nice talks. Here are some photos from yesterday @ flickr.com.

The next Webmontag Frankfurt is scheduled for 04. December. One talk will be about Google Wave. Btw many thanks to Darren & the rest of the orga team for organizing this! See you there!

PS: There are some more interesting events coming up:

1. droidcon 3./4. Nov. (Berlin, Germany)
2. BarCamp Mainz 28./29. Nov. (Mainz, Germany)
3. GTUGFRA Google Technology UserGroup Frankfurt 17. Dec. (Frankfurt/Main, Germany)

I have been invited by the organizers of the Frankfurt Book Fair for a panel discussion about digital and mobile solutions in the field of cooking and publishing.

For the first time, the Frankfurt Book Fair is offering over 400 qm exclusively to the world of food, wine and all things epicurean. The Gourmet Gallery (in Hall 5.0), one of the highlights at the book fair, features a show kitchen for live demonstrations by prominent chefs as well as talks, discussions, interviews etc. about everything cooking- and gourmet-related.

The topic of the panel discussion that I am participating in is “Cooking digital, digital Cooking: digital innovations and initiatives“. It is a B2B talk where we want to discuss examples for new ways for cookery books, trends, innovations and business models for chefs or publishing representatives. We will also talk about electronic culinary schools and getting recipes on your mobile.

Insights from the huge amount of mobile application stores and the emerging mobile widgets market will be things I can contribute, and findings from our research on these topics will come in handy, so I hope. In case you haven’t seen our wiki yet, it’s the place where we collect all available information about app stores and widget engines - our main area of business meanwhile.

It’s my first time at the Frankfurt Book Fair and I am really looking forward to this interesting panel. Many thanks to Heike Scholz @MobileZeitgeist for getting me in touch!