Developers hear iPhone ring

Indian software development firms have started developing iPhone applications for the Apple iPhone, which is yet to be introduced in India. Airtel and Vodafone "" the firms introducing iPhone in India "" will provide these firms access to a combined subscriber base of over 110 million.

Rohith Bhat, CEO, Robosoft Technologies, an Apple premier developer, says: "The iPhone is already a cult device in markets. We expect a similar response here. We will now develop applications on our own and launch them on the Apple's online store "" App Store."

A team of 35 engineers are working to develop iPhone games and entertainment applications that will be released through App Store to both Indian and international iPhone users.

Robosoft has conceptualised an India-specific entertainment application, which it plans to launch along with Airtel.

Jump Games has tied up with Vodafone and Airtel. Salil Bhargava, its CEO, says: "We will launch around 4 games for the iPhone in 4 months." Jump Games plans to distribute these games in 40 countries, including the US and UK.

According to Alok Kejriwal, CEO, Games2Win: "iPhone will open up a new breed of gaming and social networking on smartphones." His company too has conceptualised 3-4 games that would be released after iPhone release in India. Kejriwal is keen to create games for the international audiences at a download price of up to $1. "For the Indian gaming application, we might look at download rates of Rs 100," he adds.

Apple, globally, has registered over 250,000 downloads of the iPhone 3G software development kit globally. Leading developers such as AOL, Cisco, eBay, Electronic Arts and Sega have demonstrated native applications developed using the iPhone SDK. With analysts predicting more than 25 million iPhones in the market before 2008-end, developers expect big returns.

The online App Store is the centrepiece of Apple's effort to turn its iPhone media player-smartphone hybrid into an all-purpose computing platform. Apple has built the App Store into the software that will power the iPhone.

The software will be distributed to users of older iPhones and Apple's iPod Touch digital media player. The company will take a 30 per cent cut of all sales made via its App Store, but developers will be able to sell their software for any price they deem fit.