Unwired Nation

Mobile Web is the Foundation, but Native Features Make Apps More Compelling

stacey — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 15:45:56 +0000

by Frank Geck, Unwired Nation Partner Go-to

The debate around mobile initiatives to date has been mobile web vs. native applications. I’ve always been in the camp of “both is best”. Hybrid connected applications is where everything is going, regardless of the latest move of some of our favorite social network sites in recent weeks. Hybrid connected apps enjoy the scalability of web, and are also empowered with native device features, which is the point of my post.

Simply put, native features on a mobile phone make it easier for your customers to interact with you. Synonymous with Walmart’s research on “convenience of checkout”, or Web Usability Research and the barrier of “click distance”, the more you require of a user the less business you will get. This is doubly so for mobile users.

If you’re like my mother you like to stop ... Read More »

[Infographic] Newsflash: Your Users Use Apps to Connect With Brands

stacey — Sun, 16 Sep 2012 19:30:44 +0000

by Will Bridges, Unwired Nation Biz Dev Dude

Brands, and the businesses they represent, want to create relationships with consumers. And consumers (believe it or not) want to create relationships with brands. We prove this all the time by subscribing to catalogs, giving out personal information, and most importantly, spending money. The evolution of the brand-consumer relationship has always been dictated by technology and will inevitably continue to be so. The only question is, what will be the “next big thing?” The internet was the latest in the disruptive lineage of game changers, following mail, telephone, radio, and television. Most would agree then that the next big thing is mobile, and that means the brand-consumer relationship is now being represented by mobile apps and the “home screen real estate” they occupy. How is your brand poised to take advantage of this new ... Read More »

Android vs. iOS vs. Everything Else– Beauty in the Eye of the Beholder

eric — Fri, 04 May 2012 19:53:13 +0000

Christina Bonnington (@redgirlsays) with Wired asked a provocative question today; Why do iOS Apps Look Better Than Android Apps?

At the end of the day, it seems to come down to platform fragmentation and freedom of choice — with iOS, there are more polished, built-in widgets and techniques for creating a higher degree of visual polish by default, but with Android, a developer can invest time and effort to get exactly the effect they want without worrying about an officially sanctioned way to “make it look good.”

Why does this matter?

People love apps, and everyone is scrambling to create App versions of their existing products. The question is, what’s the best way to do that?

More Consolidation as Big Software Recognizes Mobile Future

eric — Wed, 11 Apr 2012 18:46:46 +0000

@LeenaRao on TechCrunch helped break the news that Syclo was acquired by SAP.

The move is further evidence of the trend toward consolidation as the software industry comes to terms with the new mobile-first future across all verticals.

Syclo’s and SAP’s approach to enterprise mobility makes perfect sense as companies continue to struggle to field mobile solutions while their core software suppliers lag behind in transitioning their products to native apps.

While Unwired Nation’s platform can be used by enterprise directly to facilitate the transitioning, deployment and management of internal enterprise applications, we work through partnerships with companies like ClearBlade when working with customers on enterprise opportunities.

Unwired Nation’s platform approach is targeted to the SaaS and Web Enablement vendors servicing the SMB space who are facing the Scalability Trap ... Read More »

Unwired Nation and Rackspace – Enabling the Enablers

eric — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 17:00:02 +0000

@lalorek with Silicon Hills News did an interview with Unwired Nation and Rackspace that was published Tuesday to talk about the company’s partnership to deliver mobile platform services to Rackspace’s 170,000 hosted and cloud customers.

She sat down with our co-founder and VP of Product and Strategy, Stacey Zuniga and Rackspace’s VP of Enterprise Strategy, Andy Schroepfer to discuss Unwired’s mobile platform and our business model of “enabling the enablers” – working with web software companies that power the customer-facing interactions for businesses around the world.

In mobile, so much of the conversation is dominated by companies that focus more on flash than on substance. As Stacey says, “In [mobile], we’re the non-sexy solution that makes money.”

We’ve talked about the Scalability Trap – how successful web software enablement companies power so many small and medium ... Read More »

Unwired Nation’s Partnership with Rackspace

jessica — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 15:52:53 +0000

by Laura Lorek, SiliconHillsNews

See Full Article

At the Starbucks across the street from Rackspace, Stacey Zuniga, a founder of Unwired Nation, last Friday talked about the company’s latest partnership. “We’re here to enable the enablers,” Zuniga said.

Austin-based Unwired Nation creates a mobile app platform for companies. It recently joined the Rackspace Partner Program to offer mobile apps as a service to select Rackspace customers.

Zuniga was on his way to a meeting with Andrew Schroepfer, vice president of enterprise strategy at Rackspace, at its San Antonio headquarters, to talk about the program.

Every company wants a mobile app for its business, Zuniga said. Unwired Nation can deliver uniquely branded apps quickly and cheaply, he said.

The problem is that for many large companies like car dealerships or pharmacies, it’s difficult for them to offer their customers a mobile version of ... Read More »

News Flash: Mobile Banking is Important

eric — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 04:47:12 +0000

Techcrunch broke a story Sunday that Montise, a UK-based mobile banking infrastructure provider had acquired Clairmail.

In a nutshell, Clairmail provides mobile banking middleware and professional services geared around SMS, mobile web, and native mobile apps.

The deal, rumored to be for $173 million, would represent a solid (if smaller-than-expected) return on the estimated $45M in venture + debt capital raised by the company since 2005 in four+ rounds from Norwest Venture Partners, Outlook Ventures, and others. (Note: Techcrunch’s Crunchbase database shows only $34.1M raised, but omits a C Round of capital and rumored debt financing).

Clairmail and Montise issued a press release that emphasized the synergies of the deal, possibly signaling the beginning of a wave of M&A in the mobile services space. Combined, the two companies service 15 of the top 50 US financial institutions.

What’s interesting about this deal ... Read More »

Death by 1000 Cuts: How Mobile Devices are Killing Web Software Companies and Endangering Small Business – And What They Can Do To Avoid the Scalability Trap.

eric — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 19:18:37 +0000

Victims of Their Own Success

Over the last decade, the vast majority of businesses have moved to web delivered software to power their organizations. Web software powers both internal processes like financial payments, controls and HR, and external customer interactions like e-commerce, promotions, customer care and support. As this trend evolved, the price point for these services declined as the quantity of powered businesses exploded. So far so good…

The Threat

It’s hard to find a business today that isn’t in some significant way enabled by web-delivered software. This trend has only accelerated in the last five years, even as mobile devices running iOS, Android, etc., have redefined how customers interact with software and the Internet, and by extension, how they interact with these businesses online.

While everyone is focused on the success of the app store phenomena and the explosive growth of mobile, this new business reality represents a significant threat to web ... Read More »

Unwired Nation™ Joins the Rackspace® Partner Program to Bring Mobile Apps to SaaS Customers

irl — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 14:07:33 +0000

Mobile Apps as a Service Provider Hosted with Rackspace to Help SaaS Customers Deliver Native Mobile Apps from Their Cloud

Austin, TX (PRWEB) March 20, 2012 Unwired Nation, the mobile-apps-as-a-service company, today announced it has joined the Rackspace Partner Program to help its SaaS customers deliver native mobile applications. Unwired Nation offers a great value-add to the thousands of SaaS companies who are today faced with the challenge of providing native mobile applications to the hundreds or thousands of customers that leverage their SaaS offering under each customer’s brand. Unwired Nation’s technology and services solve this multi-brand mobile app problem with a fast, repeatable, affordable process to move any web application to cross platform mobile apps, removing the complexities of the web-to-mobile-app transition for SaaS providers.

“Unwired Nation’s platform and services offer SaaS customers a path to mobile for their own customers that ... Read More »

Unwired Nation highlights tool to convert Web pages for smartphones

admin — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 22:41:52 +0000

Two years after recapitalizing, local software developer Unwired Nation Inc. is refashioning its business model for the mobile market.

The Austin-based company, founded in 2004, was initially designed to automate notifying customers by telephone. The new strategy is to market an online tool called Kinita that’s designed to convert Web pages to most smartphone platforms.

Shifting Unwired Nation’s focus, however, took some financial and technological creativity. Four groups of investors have invested $8.2 million in the company since it was launched, and most of them wanted to cash out after a bid by a publicly traded company to acquire Unwired Nation fell through in 2008.

So CEO Eric Smith, with backing from Houston-based venture capital firm DFJ Mercury, bought it back by restructuring debt agreements with the initial investors. He’s now looking to raise $1.5 million in expansion capital from angel investors and ... Read More »