Dutch build bridge between iPhone and Blackberry

RNW, 14 June 2011, by Robert Chesal

(Photo: Service2Media BV)

Millions of euros of foreign capital should make Dutch software company Service2Media a major player. It has developed a program which enables apps to work on a range of smartphones, from iPhone to Blackberry and everything in between.

This week founder and CEO Geert Kolthof secured foreign investments totalling seven million euros, quadrupling the company's capital. Service2Media’s aim is to develop infrastructure which will enable developers to write apps which will work everywhere: Blackberry. iPhone, Android, Google Phone and a range of tablets. The headquarters are in the town of Enschede in the east of the Netherlands but the company also has offices in San Francisco, Dubai, Barcelona and London.

Challenge

Service2Media’s developers come from universities and colleges in the Enschede region but it also uses IT specialists from Eastern Europe. This is partly because there is a shortage of IT graduates in the Netherlands.

It also has an innovative way of recruiting new talent. “We organise an App Challenge,” says Kolthof. “We put the candidates in a hotel room with free food and drink and give them a weekend to come up with an app. The winner gets 5,000 euros and a job.”

Intuitive

Many media companies have an old fashioned concept of the future of mobile devices, Kolthof argues. He shows a beautifully designed app from Flip board which enables you to order an automatically compiled newsletter based on your favourite social media and news sites. “This is out of the box thinking. Flipboard is going to be a big name, I’m convinced of that.”

He is also convinced that his own company will be big. “The mobile market is four times the size of the PC market. They’re predicting that there will be more tablets than PCs in two years time. I think there will be apps for touchscreen PCs too. Apps are everywhere. It’s a new way of navigating that is much more natural and intuitive for consumers.”

“There are already more than 500,000 apps. They’ve really invaded the consumer market, but that has yet to happen in the business market. Consumers can do their banking on the move using an app, but counter staff in banks are still using keyboards and mice. That’s time-consuming. Believe me, the apps trend will break through there too.”