It looks like there’s another third party deployment solution being touted. Nokia is offering deployment services for distribution of wireless applications called Preminet Solution (found via Tom Yager). After viewing the hideous Flash presentation and browsing around the site (why oh why is the FAQ a PDF?) this solution appears to be very much like BREW, with perhaps a few more platforms supported (java and symbian are two that I’ve found so far). Apparently the service isn’t launched yet, because when I click on the registration link, I see this:
“Please note that Preminet Solution has been announced, but it is not yet commercially launched. The Master Catalog registration opens once the commercial launch has been made.”
For mass market applications, it may make sense to use this kind of service because the revenue lost by due to paying Nokia and the operators is offset by more buyers. However, if you have a targeted application, I’m not sure it’s worthwhile. (It’ll depend on the costs, which I wasn’t able to find much out about.)
In addition, it looks like there’s a purchasing application that needs to be downloaded or can be installed on new phones. I can’t imagine users wanting to download another application just so they can buy a game, so widespread acceptance will probably have to wait until the client is distributed with new phones.
It’ll be interesting to see how many operators pick up on this. It’s another case of network effects (at least for application vendors); we’ll see if Nokia can deliver the service needed to make Preminet the first choice for operators.
Anyway, wonder if this competitor is why I got an email from Qualcomm touting cheaper something or other? (Didn’t really look at it, as I’ve written brew off until a J2ME bridge is available.)
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