AppCarousel claims answer to app discovery

Rating: Questionmarks over OS support and billing

Ahead of its official launch at the Appsworld conference next week [November 2011], Wmode has released details of its AppCarousel offering. The idea is to draw attention away from apps themselves and put the focus firmly back on brands and content. Just to be trendy, too, the company says that social networking will also play a part in the discovery process. The only thing which worries GoMo News is the phrase – [apps] can be viewed on any smartphone, tablet, or desktop. It would be nice to have a list of mobile OS supported because AppCarousel uses “visually engaging 3D” to show off apps. We can think of plenty of ‘smartphones’ that will struggle to display a 3D carousel.AppCarousel has been chatting to all kinds of content owners in the mobile app space.

“They tell us that although they have strong brands and rich content to distribute to their users across all platforms, it gets lost in the maze of fragmented content stores,” explained Terry Hughes, the newly appointed md with AppCarousel.

“What excites us about AppCarousel is the strong validation we have received from the biggest to smallest players in the app ecosystem,” Hughes continued.

“For them it comes down to two things; – better merchandising and easier discovery.”

There’s another worry. AppCarousel says it will take care of the billing. But can it?

Does this San Francisco based operation really have arrangements in place so that it can offer operator billing on a global basis? We’ll probably find out next week.

The company is, of course, claiming that it has just the kind of track record needed to make this new approach to app discovery work.

Emanuel Bertolin, CEO with Wmode, argues, “Wmode has a long history [ten years] of providing solutions for distributing mobile content.

As the digital media industry continues to grow at an unbounded pace, AppCarousel is a natural progression of our business.”

By supplying organisations with their own individual carousels, AppCarousel provides the means for content owners to curate and share relevant content with their existing audience.

The service is currently still in beta but content owners can sign up now if they want their own carousel.

Naturally, AppCarousel thinks it has spotted an obvious gap in the mobile app economy. Only time can tell.