Nokia pledges support for African developers

“Developers and solutions are at the centre of Nokia strategy. Forum Nokia is Nokia's developer programme and our task is to support the developers and help them to become successful in their business,” Seppo Oksa, head of Forum Nokia in Europe, Middle East and Africa, told Bizcommunity.com yesterday, 3 December 2009, at the closing session.

“What next? We have started the education part in the Developer Days and we have our Ovi Store available as a channel for the developers. We will follow up the participants' status and their development or business projects.

“Based on their status we will guide them to the right source of support. Be it then our online communities, documentation libraries, technical support or help in business development,” Oksa explained.

Zimbabwe-born Cardmore Chiro, a software engineer at Cape Town-based Korwe Software, told Bizcommunity.com on the sidelines of the forum: “I learned a lot from this forum, and I wish there could be more of this kind organised frequently.

“We are really struggling in Africa in terms of finding new information and updated tools, and it is amazing to discover here that there are new tools out there currently being used, which we didn't know about,” Chiro added.

“My wish is to see African developers form a solid and united community, where we can help each other as much as we can. I must say we will benefit a lot for networking with developers of the developed world, with whom we will stay in touch and ask for guidance.”

Developers came from countries such as South Africa, US, Finland, United Arab Emirates, Ghana, Nigeria, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda and Zambia.

Oksa said the developer success has four elements, namely development productivity (tools and documentation and sample applications), Nokia Developer Days training, channel access (for instance how easy it is to get one's application to the hands of a consumer).

In this area, Ovi Store is the key channel we provide for developers both locally and globally, he said.

“There is also consumer awareness. Once the applications are in the channels we need to make sure that consumers are aware of the opportunities developers' applications bring to them. In this area Nokia will launch marketing campaigns highlighting the innovations we have and will have in the Ovi Store.”

He added: “Developers have stated that they have learned a lot, so we have. Continuous discussion with developers helps us to understand the pinpoints that might be specific for certain markets.

“We have definitely learned a lot about South Africa and African mobile developers and their needs. We'll take this input seriously and take the actions needed to make African developers successful.

“So we take a look at these four elements and evaluate what we need to do in order to address Africa's needs. Locally relevant applications and services are the key-value proposition for consumers. Local developers are in key position to make that happen.”

Furthermore, Oksa said on top of the abovementioned activities Nokia is very active in the university front. “We have a good co-operation with EPROMM program and we see this co-operation being very essential in helping students to get skills in mobile development.”

For more information, go to http://forumnokia.com and www.nokia.com.