Enterprise AppForum 2014 - all about it!

We are just a few days away from the Enterprise AppForum 2014 which this year is being held in Brussels, Belgium.  For those of you who have not been before, this is a developer-only event all about apps for enterprise. The AppForum offers four parallel tracks of sessions rated as beginner, intermediate & advanced and attendees can choose the most appropriate for their level of expertise,
interest and need to attend.

The full value of attending the event also comes from the interactive discussion topics which allows for a full, free and frank exchange of ideas, 1 to 1 meetings with Motorola Solutions’ core technical team from EMEA and the USA and of course
from interaction with the other developers who will be there.

We know time is precious, so we have organised the event to run from the 18th to the 20^th of November, starting after lunch on 18^th and ending at lunchtime on the 20^th, allowing for same-day travel.  We have also chosen Brussels as our location for this year’s event with its many transport options offering easy access from across the region.

If you are curious, then you can find out what the developers said at the 2013 AppForum.

We would strongly recommend that you ensure your developer team is not missing out on this valuable event.

What can you expect to see and hear at the Enterprise AppForum2014?  Well, the Internet of Things is one of those topics that can be found in any number of newspapers and magazines at the moment and I think it is fair to say that it will be touched
on throughout the AppForum event.

Some issues that may be raised at the event include the big question which enterprises have grappled with for years in terms of how does a business decide on what is important versus what is useful in terms of data and Is the business itself always the best decision-maker when it comes to its own data and its uses?  The AppForum will also ask the what app developers bring to the table in terms of experience, as well as trying to discover what businesses need to understand about themselves in order to perform better.

Of course, the holy grail for enterprise would be the ability to access, mine and control all available data from any device: an open platform enabling business to manage inputs and output. How far off is this utopian situation?

Apple devices remain at the forefront in terms of agenda-setting and outshine most of the competition when it comes to ‘coolness’.  In enterprises too Apple devices are many user’s preference in ‘white collar’ situations.  So while legacy windows mobile developers are migrating to Android, many developers will also continue to support iOS for enterprise for specific roles where the hardware fits even though device manageability for IT departments can present a problem.

As we know however, developing in iOS can be difficult and inflexible which can hinder the developer community delivering the best app. What is the answer to this? What is your experience of developing the “same” app functionality for iOS versus Android systems?  Is the demand for iOS in enterprise as strong as for Android in your sector? We’d love to hear your stories and your answers to getting it right and the Enterprise AppForum2014  is the place to share experiences.

Of course cross-platform development tools such as RhoMobile can help mitigate against some of the time investment that single OS development requires.  But for those who prefer to go Native how do they produce multi-platform apps in the most time- and cost-effective way?

Hackathon

  The Enterprise AppForum 2014 will include a Hackathon which is intended to be a fun element upon which attendees can spend as much, or as little, time as they like either with team mates, or alone.  To spice things up a little and to keep the playing field as level as possible (no preparing in advance!) we are not announcing the theme until the first evening of the event when James
Pemberton will be metaphorically firing the starting gun.

First prize in the Hackathon is a Parrot AR.Drone.2.0 for each member of the winning team (up to 5 people). The Parrot AR.Drone 2.0 is an advanced ready-to-fly Wi-Fi controlled quadcopter which is suitable for operation indoors or outside. The second
placed team will each receive a Raspberry Pi starter kit (again, one each up to 5 members in a team).

Hackathon judges will be looking for creativity of thought, simplicity of execution and purity of design all encompassed within an app which has that elusive ‘X’ factor that sets it apart from the rest (and no, don’t worry we won’t be asking you to sing).

Multinational Event

  One of the pleasures of being involved in the Enterprise AppForum is the opportunity to meet with technical specialists from other countries and discuss areas of mutual interest whilst also having the opportunity to explore different approaches to problem-solving.

We wanted to try and understand what is in the minds of some of our participants before they come to the event next month and so reached out to a developer in Kenya. Lincoln Njogu of m:Lab is one of the African Continent’s brightest app developers, one of 7
people working for m:Lab in Nairobi. m:Lab specialises in encouraging start-up app developers and runs the annual pivoteast.com event which brings together around 100 start-up developers and gives them the opportunity to pitch their idea to a room full of judges from Africa, the US and Europe.

When we asked Lincoln what he personally hoped to gain from coming to the event and he replied simply “Working at m:Lab I’ve seen many start-ups and I’m interested in how others manage the funding aspect.  We see people who do App Development on the
side, funded by their day jobs and I am interested in how crowd sourcing and sites such as KickStarter could assist us in Africa with the work we do”.

Funding is a great issue to discuss and I firmly believe that Lincoln and you will return home with some interesting insights from other participants. We have people from over 25 countries attending the event and I know that within the audience we have a range of experiences when it comes to financing app development.

Of course, to be in with a chance of discussing the next greatest App, how data is used, what platform is best or how you fund the next generation of apps as well as to be in with a chance of winning either a Drone or the Raspberry Pi, you need to actually be
at the AppForum.  We now have less than 6 weeks to go before the Enterprise AppForum 2014 so if you haven’t signed up yet there’s still time, just visit the website for details and encourage your friends (they’re potential team mates after all) to do so too.

See you there!