Startup Founders Looking to AgTech as next Frontier
KisanHub is a startup with a simple mission: using tech to help farmers grow more crops more efficiently, while using less land. While iPad app developers might not immediately think of agriculture and farming when they think of unicorn-level startup opportunities, venture capitalists beg to differ — KisanHub just closed a $1 million seed funding […]
Can Mobile Apps Make a Real Contribution to Social Justice?
While Facebook’s stance on censorship remains murky, the unicorn tech giant has issued multiple statements insinuating that the platform — and Facebook live in particular — can have a positive impact by bringing transparency to everyday life. Last week’s controversial police shooting video, which was quickly removed from the platform before being reinstated after public […]
On-demand Service Startups Start Targeting the Suburbs
Food delivery startup Farm Hill announced their intention to expand into San Francisco last week, which doesn’t sound like hot news until you look at the context — specifically, the expansion “into” rather than “out of” a city. Farm Hill is backed by high-profile VCs like SOMA Capital and associated with Standford’s accelerator StartX. Regardless, rather […]
Freemium Pricing: Can it Work for My App?
In just a few years, freemium pricing for mobile apps has gone from an unusual fringe strategy to the dominant pricing scheme in the mobile app industry. How dominant? Well, in 2014 98% of all app revenue in Google Play came from freemium apps in the form of in-app purchases and monthly subscription fees. Apple […]
Uber Trying to Win Back Their Most Valued Resource: Drivers
Uber, like any sharing-economy mobile app developer, has two main resources: workers and customers. This may sound simplistic, but it’s actually a tricky and unique balance in the on-demand startup industry, compared with worker and consumer relations in more traditional companies. When a mobile app becomes the interface between employer and employee, efficiency increases — […]
Apple Says App Store Ad Changes Won’t Hurt Small Developers
iPhone app developers have been voicing concerns about Apple’s new App Store app-install advertising proposal, after an email to developers announcing the beta program went out to the development community. According to Apple, Search Ads will be similar to Google Adwords in that users will place bids on relevant keywords in order to appear at […]
Siri Is Finally Bridging the Gap Between Mobile and Desktop
When Apple bought Siri back in 2010, few San Francisco iPhone app developers believed it would become quite so central to the mobile experience. That success on mobile has made Mac devotees eager to use the personal assistant on other apple devices and platforms — yet it’s been years without an apparent move to jump […]
Dogs in the Office Increase Productivity and Lower Stress
Companies looking to boost office productivity are paying attention to a trend that started in Silicon Valley startups: dog-friendly work environments. NYC iPhone app developers have been bringing their canine companions to work for years, and now traditional businesses like Blue Cross, among others, are following suit. The result? Lowered stress levels, increased sense of […]
Some of the Biggest Tech Products Started as Side Projects
What do Gmail and Facebook have in common with a Post-It Note? The fact that they all started as side projects. More than any other industry, tech has offered developers and designers the chance to rapidly prototype their ideas — however off-the-wall or unrealistic — and bring them to market with minimal investment. iPhone app […]
Top 10 Reasons Your App Might Be Rejected from the App Store
Making apps is hard. Waiting for apps to be approved by the apple app store? Nerve-wracking. For developers, the biggest frustration with the App Store review process is that apps are often returned as soon as an issue is found, rather than receiving a top-to-bottom check the first time around. For example, an app returned […]