1) Smartphone ownership in Belgium is growing, with 20% of the population owning a smartphone as of May 2011, up from 42% who saw no value in them in September 2011.
2) Tablet sales nearly doubled from 2010 to the first half of 2011, while mobile internet usage on smartphones increased from 7.3% to 10.2% of the population over the same period.
3) A survey of 75 Belgian mobile app developers found that 32% were not making a living developing apps, while 23% worked as freelancers and another 23% made money directly from app stores.
Tanguy Delestré: profile of the Belgian app developer
1. Profile of the Belgian app developer market26/9/2011 Tanguy De Lestré@tdelestre @momobxl #agoria
2. Part 1: Roughmarketstats Remember? Ough! 42% of Belgians see no value in smartphones (Insites- September 2011)
3. Smartphoneequipment 20 % of population own a smartphone (Isobar -May 2011) Sales of smartphones represent 28% for S1-2 2011 vs20% in 2010 (GfK Retail and Technology Benelux extrapolated ) Yes doubling of market! 58% of Belgians see a value in smartphones (Insites- Sept 2011)
4. Connectivity 12 million active SIM cards in Belgium (BIPT - end of 2010) 10,2 % population have Mobile internet on smartphone (Isobar -May 2011) vs7,3% (BIPT 2010 S2-2010)
5. Tablets Tablets sale 97800 units S1-2 2011 vs 54800 in 2010 (GfK Retail and Technology Benelux extrapolated )
6. Belgian Mobile developer profile 75 responses Acknowledgement visionmobiledevelopereconomics report
9. How do you make money ? 32% Not making a living out of it 23% As a freelancer 23% Direct for app stores 22% Other
10. Main role of mobile operator . Visionmobile wrote “Traditionally, application developers have been cold and uncertain as to the role the operators can play in a software world;” (Visionmobile)
Profile: a Belgian mobile developer is first working in a startup, than as a hobbyist, than working in an agency. Results of vision mobile international study show a more mature market than in Belgium with a lot of in house development already, which is not yet on the scope in the Belgian survey.
The top 3 areas for a mobile developer are: the Antwerp region, the Brussels region,the Flemish Brabant province.
MoneyStill the path to richness is rough everywhere. A lot of mobile apps developers are doing it as a hobby and vision mobile suggests that worldwide they are making less than 1000 USD a month. Creating apps for the world market comes only in third position with the ‘rest category’ being a profile that combine mobile with other development like the web or free lance projects.
Role of mobile operator Visionmobile wrote “Traditionally, application developers have been cold and uncertain as to the role the operators can play in a software world;” The survey result indicates a massive response to the main role of the mobile operator limited to providing mobile data and no other roles defined at this stage.
DistributionMain source of distribution is the appstore closely followed by own websites; other channels like operator portals are minimum for the moment.
Selection of Development platformsHere is an interesting update compared to vision mobile, as HP webOS disappeared. Main traction and potential remain for top 3 IOS, Android, and HTML web apps. WP7 shows a lot of potential and also Blackberry. Symbian and Java are in the category ‘burning’ platforms, and other platforms have not enough market uptake to show significant trends.