Following Apple’s recent, very welcome clarification and improvements to the iOS Developer Program, it seems they are making some similar progressive changes for members of their Developer Enterprise Program.

They have quietly dropped the requirement that members of this program have a minimum of 500 employees. I know from discussions I’ve had with some of our customers that this restriction has affected them, so this change is good news. It seems Apple are serious about growing in the Enterprise space, a market in which they have not traditionally been strong.

It’s clearly in Apple’s interests to do everything they can to encourage Enterprise developers. With tablets expected to outsell desktops by 2013, a significant slice of which will be in the Enterprise, the iPad is well placed to retain a significant market share. As we’re seeing from some of the applications our customers are developing, the potential for vertical applications that take advantage of the device’s unique capabilities and form factor is huge. 

The question of course is how much market share Apple can hold onto? It’s going to be a competitive space, with the Samsung’s Galaxy Tab being the first tablet to have been called the iPad’s first real rival by Walt Mossberg at WSJ.

Competition is a good thing, and as you would expect, LiveCode customers will be well placed to take advantage of all these opportunities, regardless of which platform comes out on top.

Kevin Miller

RunRev CEO