Apps at the bottom of the pyramid

When Ray Newal decided to build an app that would allow users to stream TV shows and movies on to their feature phones (or non-smartphones), he knew he had to contend with low-end hardware and software, not to mention the slower GPRS connection to the internet. Also, unlike iPhones and Android phones, which have app stores, there is no single window where feature phone users can download apps.

Jigsee, the app Newal built, had to work within all these limitations. “We need to cater to a large range of screen sizes, from the extra small 128x160 screen to the large 360x640 screen. So we design our user interface keeping the smallest screen in mind and then evolve to larger screens. In fact, one phone with a 128x160 screen is among the top three phones Jigsee is used on,” says Areef Raza, chief technological officer, Jigsee.

They also had to assume that the internet speed on the phones could vary drastically, sometimes entering “dead zones” with total loss of connectivity. The app was therefore programmed to reconnect with the servers when there was data coverage without affecting the ongoing video streaming session, and it also automatically adjusts the quality of the video depending on the speed of the internet connection at that moment.

Jigsee has to date clocked five million downloads in the one year since it was launched, showing clearly that it has caught on in the mass market it targeted. The company is now in talks with TV channels to help them build platforms to serve video content over simple feature phones.

Bulk of the market
The app revolution took off in 2008 when Apple launched its App Store, providing users a one-stop shop to download apps. Small developers too got ready access to a storefront to display their apps without having to spend big money on marketing. Other players like Android and Windows soon followed suit with their own app stores. Suddenly there was an explosion of apps for smartphones.

However, smartphone users are still small in number compared to feature phone users. Even in the US, nearly half the users have feature phones. In India, only one out of ten mobile phone users owns a smartphone. App developers’ attention is therefore trained on the rapidly rising demand for apps from the remaining 90%.

“My cousin who isn’t crazy about tech owns a feature phone, which has a touch interface. Six months ago he surprised me by talking about the apps I develop. Turns out he has tried out all of them, and wants more,” says Vaidee, founder and CEO of Divum, an app development company. “He doesn’t care about distinctions between a smartphone and feature phone. He just wants the apps. Even my parents who own low-end phones have asked me to download the popular Angry Birds game on their phones.”

Divum opened shop in 2010, a couple of years after Apple launched the App Store. It began developing apps for the iPhone, then Nokia smartphones, the Blackberry and finally in 2011 for feature phones. Today, 80-90% of Divum’s ad revenues come from feature phones. “We recently developed Cricket Calling and Formula 1 Live for all platforms. The return on investment is the best for feature phones,” says Vaidee.

According to him, a combination of factors has helped the development of apps for feature phones since last year. “Feature phones are getting richer in features. Third-party app stores like Get Jar and Appia have become popular with the masses. Ad networks like Vserve have matured, which enable us to give away apps for free and earn revenues from ads. We perhaps wouldn’t have been as successful if we had started developing apps for feature phones, say, in 2009.”

Apps for all
Many smartphone apps now also have a feature phone version. Take Nextwave’s Mobile Comics Creator, which allows users to create comic strips, and is available both for smartphones and feature phones. “The smartphone version has more features, and hence is 100MB in size. You can create up to 30 pages of the comic at a time, and you can share it in an editable format. For feature phones, we have designed the app in a way that it is just 15MB in size and utilises only 2-3MB of RAM. Here you can create one page at a time, and once saved it cannot be edited,” says PR Rajendran, CEO of Nextwave Multimedia.

The main challenge for app developers is to serve the multitude of devices in the market. Only Nokia has a full-fledged store for its feature phones. Apps need standard hardware to run effectively. Home-grown players like Micromax, Karbonn, and Maxx, who have a sizeable chunk of the market, source phones from China. App developers say that the Chinese manufacturers don’t stick to one standard, and it’s very difficult to ensure their apps will run effectively on these phones.

Despite these limitations, developers know they can no longer ignore feature phone users. A few months ago, Facebook launched an initiative in India to ensure there is a Facebook app on all phones. The app offers basic functionality, allowing users to access their feeds, combining with the address book, and offering multi-lingual support. “The idea is to get people to connect even on feature phones,” says Kevin D’Souza, country growth manager, Facebook India.