Fall and decline
If nothing else, the WAC's web-centric approach is arguably forward-looking in the sense that widgets and browser-based apps are at the forefront of the current interest in moving to cloud-based apps and services. Google has been instrumental in talking up the web as the future of mobile apps, but at least one analyst firm, ABI Research, has produced some numbers backing that vision - to a point.
ABI senior analyst Mark Beccue says that consumers downloaded 2.4 billion apps from smartphone apps stores in 2009, and the growth rate will crest just shy of seven billion in 2013, after which app store downloads will start to decline.
That doesn't mean app stores will die out, Beccue cautions. "Following the 2013 peak in demand, the number of downloads in 2015 will have decreased only 7% or 8%. But as our use of the mobile internet evolves, demand will increasingly shift elsewhere."
One factor in that projection is the rise of popular apps being preloaded on mobile devices, particularly social networking apps, but the web will play a major role in the demand shift, Beccue says, as well as the launch of cellco-run app stores targeting feature phones, which could mean access to developing markets where smartphone penetration is lower.
Another factor that may work in favor of WAC is that despite all the hype over app store download figures, developers are becoming increasingly unhappy with the current storefront model.
Part of that is related to vendor-imposed restrictions on apps development, the most visible example of which is Apple's current and controversial ban on Adobe Flash and all third-party APIs not approved by Apple.
Developers also don't care for the 70%-30% revenue sharing breakdown pioneered by Apple and adopted by most other platforms. A recent survey from Evans Data found that 80% of apps developers in North America dislike the 70/30 split, with over 70% adding that they want to be free to set their own prices rather than have them dictated by the storefront owner.
Between that and other issues like content restrictions (such as Apple's widely criticized policy of rejecting apps considered too sexy for the general public), only 15% of respondents bother to use apps storefronts as a sales channel, while over half prefer direct sales.
Whether WAC will capitalize on that discontent by differentiating itself on price controls, revenue splits and content restrictions remains to be seen, of course. For the time being, says Rethink Research analyst Caroline Gabriel, WAC still has a long way to go to make its case to developers that cellcos can not only work together (even with direct competitors) to create a unified apps ecosystem with a simple single-entry-point submission and approval process, but can also do it better than the existing alternatives.
"WAC has a hard task to convince the software world that its frameworks and APIs are as appealing and usable as those from open web majors like Google," Gabriel said in a research note, citing a recent Ovum study that found 65% of developers plan to use Google's server-side APIs, with only 25% interested in cellco equivalents.
However, that's mainly because cellco APIs - including OneAPI and all its purported advantages, such as enabling presence, billing and location functionalities in widgets - are still in the fledgling stage, and haven't been widely promoted outside the mobile sector, she adds.
"This will be as important a priority for WAC as releasing its first framework," Gabriel says.