Two independent mobile application stories caught our eye today. Bytemobile has announced a “widget bar” for mobile operators, which could be displayed at the top of any mobile Internet page. And Gomez has announced an upgrade for it’s entire mobile and web application development platform.
Bytemobile:
The widget bar from Bytemobile isn’t a new service – we first reported it at the start of April. It allows an operator to display a bar across the top of the screen of the mobile browser on any device. It allows, for example, the operator to target particular apps at browsers:
Updates:
GUI: there have been performance updates to the Portal application that displays content across the top of the web page, to make it less intrusive to the user.
Social networking: a “Share This” service allows mobile content to be instantly sent to friends through Facebook and Twitter.
Notifications: this service allows the operator to ping messages directly to a mobile Web browser via the widget bar – stuff like promotions or info on roaming.
From the release:
“The flexible design of Bytemobile’s Widget Bar enables operators to customize the toolbar above the main content of every web page and easily deploy new applications,” said Adrian Hall, chief marketing officer of Bytemobile. “As a result, they can deliver value-added services that are most relevant to their customers and thereby create new opportunities for incremental data revenue. Bytemobile customer feedback has shown that the Widget Bar improves the monetization of data traffic while simplifying the browsing experience with fast and easy access to useful, personalized applications and content.”
What we think?
I quite like this service, and it’s one of the few widget/application platforms I’ve seen that’s pro-operator. The bar allows operators to push their own favoured apps, have branding always visible on browser pages, and communicate directly with their consumers. This is actually a method by which operators can tackled the feared “dumb pipe” problem. And while it may annoy people to have this little invasive bar at the top of their screen, it is opt-in. They can always just turn it off.
Gomez:
Gomez provides a software-as-a-service platform for testing and optimizing applications. It’s mostly targeted at Web 2.0 apps, but Gomez also provides for mobile applications. I’m only mentioning the mobile app relevant ones here, but for a full list of the upgrades, check this page: http://www.gomez.com/gomez-unveils-major-platform-upgrade-to-optimize-performance-and-quality-of-web-and-mobile-applications/
Mobile testing and monitoring: this service tackles mobile Web sites, mobile applications and SMS services. It will allow Gomez clients to test how their apps perform with the three most popular data services on mobile.
Mobile device expansion: Gomez runs an automatic cross-browser testing service for apps. It claims to have now upgraded to supporting 5,000 different mobile devices, including major smartphones. This service automates rendering and performance testing for apps on difference combinations of mobile device and mobile browser.
From the release:
Jaime Ellertson, Gomez’s CEO: “End-users expect Web and mobile applications to be richer and faster; a double conundrum for the developers that build them, the IT operations teams that manage them, and the e-business executives that depend on them for revenue and brand building. The upgrades to the Gomez platform provide businesses with the most powerful and cost-efficient set of integrated solutions, helping to optimize their most important Web pages and transactions and meet end-users’ expectations for speed and quality.”
Dennis Drogseth, Vice President, Enterprise Management Associates: “Gomez’s platform-wide refresh offers strong advantages for its customers and will challenge market competition. If there are two consistent themes to the overall refresh it is the cohesiveness with which user experience can be interpreted, analyzed and diagnosed, on the one hand, and the full bore commitment to advancing technology requirements – in particular Web 2.0, browser diversity, and mobility.”
What we think?
5,000 devices? That’s a lot. Too many, actually. That sounds like press release padding to me. Even the most popular mobile testing services tend to have less than 3,000 devices available to be tested. Aim lower next time, Gomez, this comes across as empty bragging.
Thanks for including Gomez’s news in your story. I would like to point out that there is truth in the 5000-device statement as our solution leverages dotmobi’s DeviceAtlas which supports this many mobile devices.
I found it interesting that this kind of mobiles manipulate the HTML source of web-pages. They strip-down content thus breaking the display. They do not follow the rfc (css/html) specs and so what you see may not be the actual page.