3 Recent Insights into Enterprise Apps

March 24, 2017
 
Ashley Rondeau

Two great reports were recently published giving the mobile industry a good look at what’s going on with enterprise-level companies and their mobile strategy in 2017. The reports are from ContractIQ and Fliplet and here are the three data points that we thought were most interesting.

1. Companies gain 240 hours of work per year using enterprise apps.

According to the report from Fliplet, companies that utilize enterprise apps get more work out of their employees to the tune of 240 extra hours a year. This stat goes hand-in-hand with Fliplet also reporting that 71% of employees spend 2+ hours a week working (ie. accessing company info) from their mobile devices.
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This just reaffirms that we live and work in a mobile-first environment, and it behooves companies to change their internal work-structure to take advantage of how employees are already utilizing technology. By making it easier to work remotely or to perform tasks on phones or tablets, enterprises are equipping the modern worker to be productive on his or her own terms. And far from making people more lazy, the numbers show that a mobile workforce is a productive workforce.

2. 60% of businesses now have ROI goals for mobile apps.

In 2015, only 30% of businesses that built apps for themselves had revenue goals for those apps. Meaning, less than a third of companies didn’t really know whether an app was actually doing anything for their bottom line. Luckily in 2016, we’re already at 60%. This is a big jump, and an exciting one.
The reason this is so important is that enterprise apps are created for 1) productivity, and 2) collecting data. Since developing a mobile app can be a costly investment, it’s incredibly important for every company to analyze the ROI on both these points. Is your company more productive using these apps? Is the data you’re collecting useful in increasing efficiency or cutting costs? Now that the majority of enterprises are taking apps seriously, we’re happy that these apps are being put to the ROI test. After all, as app developers, we know just how efficient they can be at increasing revenue. As more companies put actual hard numbers behind this, it will only increase the appetite for more apps.
And as the Fliplet report shows, that appetite is growing. Enterprises created an average of 10.6 apps in 2016, compared to 4.7 in 2015.

3. Android is gaining on iOS for enterprise app development.

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The pie chart couldn’t be clearer: Android won a big slice of the pie from iOS from 2015 to 2016 going from 23.4% to 42%. This is actually a surprising statistic since overall, the iPhone has gained market share compared to Android phones. So why the discrepancy?
The best theory seems to be that this is due to more and more enterprises having a BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) mindset when approaching mobile. Remember, Android still has a global majority due to the sheer number of phones and tablets that run the OS. As more devices “come online” to be used for work purposes (a direct result of more companies going mobile-first), it makes sense that Android is gaining steam with enterprise users.
And of course, this means that more and more enterprise apps have to be developed for Android to accommodate these devices. We expect this trend to continue, and it will be an interesting battle to see iOS and Android and Windows competing for enterprise app market share.
Is your enterprise taking advantage of mobile apps?
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So, if you don’t know where to get started with a blueprint for your app, Rocket Farm Studios can take the pressure off.

The State of Windows Phone in 2017

March 16, 2017
 
Ashley Rondeau

The horror/suspense movie Get Out was fantastic. From end-to-end it was genuinely scary, but there was one thing in the movie that was the most out of place, off-putting, and strange. The main character (and all the characters, really) used Windows Phones.
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Obviously, Microsoft had a deal with the studio and wanted to get some advertising in. In actuality, anytime the Windows logo was seen on a phone or a Surface (or Bing Search, especially), people in the theater chuckled. It was a bit of unintentional comedy throughout the movie. But why?

Windows Phone market share is almost gone.

The theme of Get Out was all about how scary it can be to be a minority, and it’s fitting that the protagonist uses a Windows Phone. According to IDC Research, by 2021 Windows Phone shipments will drop from the 0.1% that it is today, to zero. That’s remarkable, especially considering that Windows Mobile (the mobile OS before rebranding) was the market leader along side Symbian just 10 years ago with 42% of the market. But 10 years ago the iPhone dropped and everything changed.
Today, Windows Phone is an endangered species, clearly shown on this interactive chart of mobile OS usage made by Kantar World Panel. Here’s a snapshot of the US:
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It’s clear to see that the US has been a two OS country for years now. In fact, just 3 million people in the US use a Windows Phone and the numbers are dropping fast. So what went wrong for the once leader in the mobile space?

Remember the Zune?

For the kids reading, the Zune was Microsoft’s attempt at the iPod killer. It looked like this:
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And it failed for two reasons laid out by Robbie Bach, the former leader of Microsoft’s mobile business:

The portable music market is gone and it was already leaving when we started. We just weren’t brave enough, honestly, and we ended up chasing Apple with a product that actually wasn’t a bad product, but it was still a chasing product, and there wasn’t a reason for somebody to say, oh, I have to go out and get that thing.”
We did some really artsy ads that appealed to a very small segment of the music space, and we didn’t captivate the broad segment of music listeners.

So in essence: 1) too little, too late; and 2) too niche.
Those two reasons are basically why Windows Phone is failing as well. When the iPhone hit in 2007 and caught everyone with their pants down, Microsoft didn’t move quickly enough to compete. And even when they did, it wasn’t a priority for them, unlike over at Google where they made mobile a top priority. By the time Microsoft realized mobile was the future of tech (and hardware, and business, etc), it was too late.
And their products were good, but only serviced a specific segment of users: those who were already Windows acolytes. Well-designed phones like the Lumia series were handicapped by Windows Phone OS that only appealed to die-hard Windows users. Potential customers stayed away in droves because the best apps were just never available on Windows Phones like they were with iOS and Android. Microsoft didn’t try hard enough to please the masses.
Zune history repeated itself all over again with Windows Phone. And it’s still happening…

The Surface Phone is already late, and won’t help.

The Microsoft Surface’s market share is growing by leaps and bounds, and it’s a bona fide hit. To piggyback off its success, Microsoft announced they would rebrand their smartphones under the Surface name. That caused a modicum of interest, but the Surface Phone has been delayed to maybe 2018 or 2019 and rumored specs are not impressive. Again, this is too little, too late.
We are in the business of making apps and anecdotally, requests for Windows Phone apps have all but dried up. There isn’t much chatter in our industry about developing for Windows 10 Mobile and even with the advent of the Surface Phone, we don’t really expect that to change. Both the people and companies have spoken, and for smartphones, it’s a two horse race.
But don’t expect Microsoft to give up. They’ve got deep pockets and they know by now that mobile is the future. Maybe business tablets will be their niche, or they’ll try making an Xbox Mobile to compete with the Nintendo Switch, or perhaps something in the Internet of Things realm will take off for them. Smartphones may be a lost cause, but we’d bet they have more mobile moves to make.
What do you think of Windows Phone?
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So, if you don’t know where to get started with a blueprint for your app, Rocket Farm Studios can take the pressure off.

mHealth Apps and Wearables Can’t Make You Less Lazy

March 9, 2017
 
Ashley Rondeau

Like 20% of the US population, I have a fitness tracker usually strapped somewhere on my pathetic and out of shape body. I was excited to get it, sure that it would motivate me to walk those 10,000 steps each day until I would feel great about swimming with my shirt off. Well, it’s been a couple years. I still wear it, but I still swim in a hoodie.
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Fitness trackers don’t work, says science.

Ultimately, the problem is that exercise sucks and Oreos are great. But for this specific instance, mobile health (mHealth) apps and wearables have been proven not to do much for humans at all. In fact, they might hinder weight loss. A recent article in the New York Times summarized the results of a 2-year study of 470 adults who tried to lose weight with fitness trackers. The result: the half that used wearable tech lost an average of 7.7 pounds; and the half that didn’t lost almost double that. And not only did the techie half lose less weight, but they weren’t any more fit either.
Apparently, most people are like me and a prompt once in a while from the phone or wrist isn’t enough to rouse us from our beanbag chair when there is still so much The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild left to play on our new Nintendo Switch (a gadget that doesn’t judge me). And speaking of Nintendo…

PokĂ©mon Go (and similar apps) won’t get you fit either.

So maybe the fitness trackers aren’t enough. Maybe we need something fun to get us moving. After all, PokĂ©mon Go helped this Brit lose 28 pounds.
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source: cnn.com

But as Lifehacker pointed out, you have to play a lot of Pokémon Go to really lose weight:

In the game, you hatch pokémon from eggs you collect at PokéStops, then walk (or run) certain distances to hatch them. So, hatching a 2.0 km egg burns around 120 calories (and that’s a generous estimate). That means you’d need to hatch 30 2.0 km eggs in order to lose just one pound. Not to mention, all the stopping to catch pokémon and collect items at PokéStops slows the whole process down. Because of that, a regular, phone-free walk around the park or office is better for you in the long run.

Since obesity rates are going up, and PokĂ©mon Go usage is going down; it looks like even the most addictive apps won’t save us from ourselves after all. So much for mHealth, right?

The real promise of mHealth.

Better healthcare from mobile apps and technology is not about nagging people to walk a mile. That’s not how it’ll change the world. Real benefits from mHealth will come from using data to come up with better treatments, connecting more physicians to people in need, and providing faster medicine and diagnosis.
We’ve written previously about the potential of mobile healthcare apps and products, and new ideas are emerging all the time. Have you heard of PillDrop, doctHers, or MedMee? They’re already making a difference globally, and it seems like the healthcare industry is only just scratching the surface of what mHealth can do.
For example, over 7 million patients are being remotely monitored as part of their care routines. According to the article, “mHealth applications like therapeutic monitoring and general care delivery platforms can help providers reach several patients at once and cut costs to bolster patient engagement.”

The future of healthcare is mobile.

We’re on the horizon of a very exciting time in healthcare. While current politics is considering taking away care from millions of people, mHealth is surging forward to help lower costs, provide for more people in need, and bring about breakthroughs in care.
And who knows? Maybe one day, this thing on my wrist will actually make me healthy.
What do you think about the coming mHealth revolution?
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So, if you don’t know where to get started with a blueprint for your app, Rocket Farm Studios can take the pressure off.