Nokia created Forum Nokia in 1996 to provide support to developers who were working with the technologies, such as messaging, Java or Symbian OS, supported by Nokia devices. Since it launch Forum Nokia has attracted 1.35 million active users. While this community is a measure of Forum Nokia's success the wireless industry has changed a lot since 1996 and Forum Nokia found its self working increasingly with companies that have fully embraced the wireless marketplace, rather than individual developers. Forum Nokia PRO has grown out of the feedback from this growing group of mature wireless companies to better serve their needs.

For an annual fee for 3000 developers get a range of services including an 80% discount off standard Forum Nokia support call, access to prototype devices, a developer kit which currently includes the Nokia 6600 and recently published book "Developing Series 60 Applications: A Guide for Symbian OS C++ Developers" along with SDK and sample code. These kits are refreshed quarterly. More business orientated offerings include, access to booth space within a Nokia stand at specific events such as Cebit or JavaOne, referrals when journalists contact Nokia looking for wireless companies, and a press kit to help create effective press release with pertinent market facts. This is also a global development team tasked with ensuring Forum Nokia PRO developers get access into Nokia and distribution channels. Finally Nokia will also be sharing developer platform and device roadmap information with members of the program. Marc Naddell (title) is Nokia's driving force behind the new Forum Nokia PRO offering and SymbianOne had the opportunity to discuss the changes with Marc recently.

Richard: Marc, thanks for finding time to talk to SymbianOne, perhaps we could start by talking about how Nokia will measure the success of the Forum Nokia PRO program?

Marc: We will be measuring the success of the program by the success of the developers who are enrolled. The companies we are looking for will have compelling, sustainable ideas that can take advantage of the program to grow their business and become successful. Our goal is very simply to see these companies meet or exceed their business goals.

Richard: Typically what would you expect the company profile to be?

Marc: We looked at number of demographic and psychographic variables while we were developing the program. Typical companies will have a developer pool of between 10 and 30 developers. Most of them will be high profile regional players, such as an excellent gaming company from Germany or a solutions company from California, who are trying to escape a single region and looking for a partner with global reach to help them reach global markets.

Another important feature will be their application focus, it will match up well to our Developer Platform, so the company may be creating solutions in messaging, imaging, gaming, enterprise or productivity, any of those categories where we are promoting our products. There would be typical technologies too, the company would be working with Symbian C++ or J2ME, messaging such as MMS or MMS, browsing or photo and image technology.

However we also expect that there will be many companies which fall outside this norm, they could be bigger or smaller, or be working with innovative new technologies. Ultimately the only thing we expect to be truly typical about the companies in the program is their desire for success in the wireless marketplace.

Richard: It sounds a little as though a big check book won't simply buy a developer into the program?

Marc: Correct, even a company like Nokia has finite resources that we can provide to a developer company. As our goal is to foster success in the program participants we want to make sure we don't squander the resources on companies who are not truly serious about mobile development.

Richard: So the program seems very clearly to not be about generating revenue?

Marc: No. It is not a way of turning a cost centre into a profit centre. If you compare the admission fee of 3000 to say the regular costs for using a Developer Hub and it should be clear that developers can quickly recoup the application fee.

Richard: So how many developers do you expect to accommodate in the program?

Marc: Our near term expectation is to be supporting a few hundred developer companies, and to gradually increase that number with the success of the program.

Richard: While Nokia has 6 or 7 years experience of running Forum Nokia you have used the services of Metrowerks in launching this program, why is that?

Marc: We made the decision to create Forum Nokia PRO in response to the changing market and set ourselves a tight schedule to launch the offering. Metrowerks has considerable experience in the area of managed developer programs and already had the technology building block necessary to build Forum Nokia PRO. Because of this we were able to leverage some specific expertise from Metrowerks and deliver the additional services to market very quickly.

Richard: Do you see the relationship expanding?

Marc: I expect the needs of our developer community and therefore the nature Forum Nokia and Forum Nokia PRO will be dynamic. We hope to be vigilant in identifying and reacting to these changes. Forum Nokia PRO has been a great opportunity for us to work with Metrowerks and evaluate how we can help each other.

Richard: Do you have any views on where Forum Nokia is going?

Marc: What I'm interested in is how our developer partners want our offering to develop. Forum Nokia PRO gives us a deeper conduit for discussions with developers and so understand how we can enhance our offering. We certainly want to ensure that the offering is as vibrant and relevant as possible and I expect that we will do that through constant upgrades and improvements in our programs.

Nokia's launch of Forum Nokia PRO clearly reflects the changing market place for wireless developers. It could be argued that much of the change is a reaction to changes made in other developer program as it is about the marketplace, however SymbianOne believes it is more about a fundamentally understanding that, in the future, the success of Nokia's wireless devices will increasingly be about what the owner can add to the device than simply the of the box functionality. This means that Nokia needs a solid core of quality developers creating innovative applications and services using Nokia technology, Forum Nokia PRO is very obviously designed to help build that core of successful developers.

Web: https://pro.forum.nokia.com