Estimated Cost of Enterprise Mobile Application Development
Enterprise mobile application development has gained significant momentum with the app ecosystem becoming increasingly powerful. Here’s a look at the cost of creating a robust enterprise solution and how mobile app development platforms can help lower the budget substantially.
Mobile apps are no longer optional for businesses. They are quickly becoming mandatory for companies of all sizes and across industries. Very often, one of the first questions that businesses ask when considering enterprise mobile application development is “How much will it cost?” There’s no simple answer to this question. Several factors determine the cost of your mobile app. Additionally, several challenges make it difficult to pin an accurate number for the price.
While it’s true that apps are indeed expensive, it needn’t rob a bank, if you plan it right. The cost of enterprise mobile application development ultimately depends on what you want to create and how you build it.
The best way to figure out the accurate cost is to start with an MVP (Minimum Viable Product). This is a limited version of your final app. By building and deploying the MVP, you get an accurate idea of the total costs of the next iteration of your app.
Other factors that determine the overall cost of enterprise mobile application development include:
Type of App
User Experience/User Interface Design (Front-end Development)
Back End Development
Technologies Used
Opting for a powerful Mobile Application Development Platform (MADP) to develop your app
Other data — Like location-based data and sensor feed
Enterprise mobile application development consists of three Cs — Conceive, Construct and Continue. There are several steps involved in each phase. The overall cost of app development depends on the steps involved in each process.
While there’s no fixed number that suits all projects, you can figure out the estimate by considering all the factors mentioned above. Alternatively, you can specify your project requirement to a professional mobile application development firm to get a rough quote. Based on this price estimate, you can refine the features and functionalities of the app to suit your budget.
Today, mobile apps are the primary drivers of businesses. From small startups to massive Fortune 500 companies, B2C to B2B, all businesses profit immensely by building an enterprise app geared for their specific business model.
According to the 2017 US Cross-Platform Future in Focus study by ComScore, 7 out of 10 minutes spent on digital media is mobile, and out of the time spent on mobile, over 60% is spent on apps. A look at the densely populated mobile app stores, which contain over 5 million apps, is enough to justify the fact that mobile apps have grown to become one of the most lucrative revenue streams for businesses.
Are you thinking about building an enterprise app for your business? Worried about the development costs? Not sure whether it’ll fit in your budget?
Here in this post, you can find all that you need to know to estimate the cost of your enterprise mobile application development.
Before diving into the estimates, let’s take a look at the challenges involved in estimating app development costs.
Challenges Involved in Estimating the Cost of Enterprise Mobile Application Development
Very often, people falsely assume that enterprise mobile application development is a simple process that includes working out the logic of the app, doing a bit of coding and testing, followed by deploying it on the app store.
The reality is a bit complicated. There is plenty of work going behind the scenes to convert your business goals into a thriving enterprise app.
Here are a few challenges that businesses face while estimating the cost of enterprise mobile application development:
Underestimating the complexity of the mobile app
Improper understanding or not being clear about the volatility of the mobile app ecosystem
Choosing a mobile application development platform (MADP) that isn’t ideal for the specific goal
Failing to include the costs of continuous improvement, user experience, and testing complexities
Ignoring mobile usage analytics and user feedback
Considering all these challenges and other complications of mobile app ownership, we have put together a plan that gives you an accurate estimate of your enterprise app.
Roadmap to Estimating the Cost of Enterprise Mobile Application Development
Begin with a Minimum Viable Product (MVP)
Let’s explain it this way. Imagine you’re throwing a party at your place and have invited around two dozen of your friends. You have made arrangements for all those in your list, ordered food and drinks. What if only a handful of people showed up to the event?
The party is sure to be a letdown and not to forget all the money and time you spent on getting it ready for the whole lot.
You don’t want the same to happen to your mobile app. What if no one downloaded your app? Sounds scary, ain’t it? This is the reason why experts recommend starting with an MVP.
An MVP helps you take a certain amount of uncertainty out of the equation. A minimum viable product has just the basic features and functionalities, and other complex features come in the next stage of development.
To estimate the total cost of enterprise mobile application development, shareholders, management, and your development team must get together to discuss and agree on the core components of the MVP. The key to a successful MVP is to include features that are likely to be used by your customers.
Once you have decided on what to be included, you can then ask your app development team to build and launch it to reach your targeted audience. The MVP can then be further refined and improved in successive iterations based on user feedback and other real-time suggestions.
The MVP can help you in figuring out the costs of future enhancements.
Factors Influencing the Cost of Enterprise Mobile Application Development: Things That Matter
Type of App
Native Apps: These are apps that are built for a particular platform. Different platforms using specific scripting languages. Native apps are faster and more efficient compared to other apps. For Android, the language used is Java, and Kotlin is the supported language. For iOS, the languages used are Objective C and Swift. Depending on the MADP your programmer uses, the cost of native apps vary.
Hybrid Apps: These are primarily small websites that run on a native app shell. This means app developers who are well-versed in web development find it easy to build these apps. Hybrid apps are cheaper to build when compared to other apps but offer limited functionality and a simple interface.
Cross-Platform Apps: As the name implies, these apps work on both iOS and Android platforms. The UI/UX of these apps is similar to native apps, and the same code can be reused for both platforms. However, feature richness in cross-platform apps is somewhat limited when compared to native apps.
Instant/Progressive Apps: These are the latest apps to hit the market, and they are mostly websites that offer app-like experience.
The cost of enterprise mobile application development varies based on the type of solution you wish to build.
User Experience/User Interface Design
The UI/UX plays a vital role in determining the cost as well as the success of your app. Designing a clutter-free interface that provides users with the best experience is indeed a challenge. The cost of the app depends on the type of interface you choose. Opting for a subtle interface with minimal graphics is less expensive. On the other hand, if you want a feature rich interface using AR, VR, and animations, then it may cost you more.
Backend Development
If you’re building an app that fetches data from an extensive database, then your app would require extensive backend development. Ticket booking apps that compare check and book flights are an example. Another example is streaming apps that fetch videos from various online sources.
MADP (Mobile Application Development Platform)
Mobile Application Development Platforms (MADPs) offer a great way to expedite the enterprise app development process.
MADPs make use of reusable code modules that are bug-free and pre-tested. With the right MADP, you can reduce the time spent on coding as well as testing, which in turn reduces your overall development time as well as costs. Additionally, the right MADP plays a critical role in improving the quality of your app, as it includes pieces of code that are some of the best in the industry.
If you are looking for speedy development of your enterprise mobile app at a lower cost, opt for an optimum high-end MADP that offers customization and other features like one-click integration with ERP/CRM as well as social media and other application in your existing enterprise system.
There are a wide variety of MADPs available on the market. Some are open-source while others are proprietary. Different MADPs have varying pros and cons. The cost and development time of your app depends on the MADP used to build it.
To keep the overall app development costs low and to make your app stand out from your competitors, you need to choose the right MADP. For further customization, you can take help from an app developer and get the app as per your exact specifications.
Location-based data / Sensor Input
Apps that use location-based data or data from real-time sensors are going to cost extra for development.
Trending Technologies
If your app runs on emerging technologies like blockchain, IoT, AI, Machine Learning, AR, VR, then you can expect an increase in the development cost.
Costing Each Step of the Process
Enterprise mobile application development consists of three Cs — Conceive, Construct and Continue. There are different costs involved in each step of this process. Here are a few factors that contribute to the cost of the application development in each phase.
The Final Calculation
While no fixed mobile app development package fits all projects, you can figure out an approximate estimate of the cost of your enterprise app by considering the factors mentioned above. Once you have arrived at this number, you can increase or decrease functionalities based on your budget as well as business objectives.