The Star Online: Nation
The Star Online: Nation |
| Posted: HE likes Malay food; she likes Western food. But like any technopreneur worth his salt, Ezmir Mohd Razali (pic) turned the little "problem" at home into a business opportunity. "After we got married, my wife tried very hard to learn all my favourite recipes from my mother. However, she needed to refer to my mother quite often as some of the recipes were quite complicated and sometimes her cooking didn't turn out as expected. So I came up with the idea to record videos of all my favourite recipes from my mother." The growing mobile application usage gave him another idea: make a mobile recipe video app for other newlyweds. The app, which he named Trymasak, offers not only his mother's recipes but also other interesting local and traditional recipes. "We decided to include other recipes so that other people could also benefit from this. What users can do is bring their smartphone into the kitchen and follow the step by step guide in the Trymasak videos," he says, adding that the app also contains a feature to help users manage their grocery list of ingredients for their favourite recipes. Trymasak now has had more than 60,000 downloads and Ezmir hopes to hit the 100,000 mark by early next year. The biggest challenge for local app developers is still marketing their product, he shares. "To overcome this we keep the app development as simple as possible, and focused on the main value proposition. Based on the users' feedback, we sought to improve on it." He believes Malaysia has all the right ingredients to be a top mobile app and content developing country, at least in the region. Malaysia not only has a high mobile penetration rate, he points out, but also a good pool of app developers and talents, thanks to initiatives by stakeholders like the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) and MDeC to provide funding and support for the industry. "We also have a high take-up rate for mobile apps, both private, such as in banking and airline booking, and in the public sector with the Police's MyDistress app, Mampu and others." Related stories: Screening Shariah status of investments Sharing of baby photos made easy Malaysian app developers still lack market knowledge |
| Sharing of baby photos made easy Posted: HAVING a baby in February changed the life of Tang Tung Ai, technical director and founder of application software company Icon Mobi Solution. "I became like my friends who were first-time parents. I found myself taking a lot of photos of my newborn baby," he says. Intrigued, he researched the habits of other new parents on social networks and found pictures of babies and food among the most popular. That gave him the idea for InstaB for Baby, a mobile app that provides a one-click solution for parents to customise their baby photos or videos. "Going through the same experience and seeing all the pictures of other new parents convinced me there is a market for this app. Parents like to customise and make their baby photos unique, and at the same time, they want to be able to keep track of small things like what the baby was doing at that particular time, age and mood." InstaB allows parents to automatically add the essential information of their child on the photos from age, gender, zodiac, date and the baby's mood, and then share them on social networks. "We are not trying to solve a problem here, but we are meeting a need. Many parents feel they need to organise or personalise their children's pictures and videos," he adds. Tang, who has more than 12 years of industry experience in application software, only started developing mobile apps seriously around four years ago. To hone his skills, he joined the Multimedia Development Corporation's Integrated Content Development (Icon) programme and various mobile app development contests. Last year, Tang got together with two friends to set up Icon Mobi Solution. InstaB was launched on the Apple App Store in May and on Android later this year. The app got a big response from Malaysian and Singaporean users and has been downloaded more than 20,000 times, generating over 80,000 pieces of content. To keep their users coming back for more, Tang is working on adding more features to the app, including a video feature. "We want to create more useful features because we believe the extra features will help build InstaB users' base. We also have to keep up with the rapid technology changes and the competitive app space. Every day, more apps are launched, and any one of them can take over your market niche," he says. Features like the video can give them opportunities to monetise the app, especially through video advertisements, he adds. Marketing the app is also a challenge due to the big budget that it normally entails. "Currently, we are using a low-cost marketing strategy such as SNS, holding photo contests and working closely with an online baby store," he says. Tang's target is to have 100,000 users by the end of the year, which he admits will not be easy as Malaysian users do not like to pay for apps. "But I do think this is one of the few app categories that users are willing to pay for," he says. Related stories: Screening Shariah status of investments Age does not deter gifted app creator Tapping into latest promotions |
| Tapping into latest promotions Posted: MALAYSIANS' love for promotions is the idea behind the app Perks designed by Ker Jia Chiun and Tan Jit Ren. Calling themselves Team Pillow, Ker and Tan entered the Malaysia Developer's Day 2013 (MDD2013), a hackathon organised by AT&T and the MCMC, recently and won the first prize of US$10,000 (RMRM32,000) with Perks, which provides a fast and easy way for people to look for promotions. The app incorporates the social media element, turn-by-turn navigation and also tracks achievements that allow users to view all the promotions available with a single tap on the sign-in icon. They based their idea on Malaysia's Facebook usage statistics, which showed that the average Malaysian spends at least 20% of his or her time on the social media network looking for promotions. However, when they surfed through the three big mobile stores – AppStore, Play Store and Marketplace – they found only a few Malaysian promotions-based apps available. "We knew there were some gaps here and there, and therefore it was something that can be improved further," says Ker. The team spent a lot of time on the design of the app to make it look attractive and more "international" as well as adding on personal touches. "We felt that paying attention to 'user experience' was the key in developing an app such as this," says Tan. He concedes that the biggest challenge will be sustaining the attention and interest of users on a particular product. "Statistics have shown that consumers have the tendency to ignore your product after 10 seconds if they find nothing interesting," he says. However, these budding app developers are confident that the local app developing industry will only grow, especially with more app designing competitions and support from related agencies and global telcos. Earlier this month, Team Pillow got the opportunity to present their product at the Global Entrepreneurship Summit in Kuala Lumpur as part of their prize. "We know the competition in the international market is very strong. But Malaysia is not that far behind other countries. Competitions like the MDD2013 will give budding app developers a chance to build on their ideas. It shows the world what we can do and gives us an opportunity to meet potential investors there. Perhaps more agencies and colleges can look into organising similar competitions," says Tan. Related stories: Sharing of baby photos made easy Screening Shariah status of investments |
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