KUNAL SONI: Hi, everyone.
Thanks, Francis.
I'm Kunal.
And I look after the Google Play Apps and Games business
for Southeast Asia and India.
Welcome.
It's fantastic to have all of you here, this evening,
and to be talking to you about the exciting world
of mobile apps.
So clearly, I think, as Google, one of our most important
objectives is to work with you all, our developers,
our partners, to help create high quality apps, apps that
will connect meaningfully with users in India
and touch lives, delight users, engage users, and entertain
users.
Right?
As we all know, Android has seen some massive momentum
over the last few years.
And the exciting part is that even
going forward, given that there is so much opportunity
for smartphone penetration in this country to improve,
that momentum will continue to drive growth forward.
Right?
As a community, I think the one big challenge
that we need to think deeply about-- if we
are to really unlock this opportunity
and make on-boarding, engaging, and retaining users easier--
is about creating apps that will work effectively
in the hardware and connectivity landscape
that you see in India today.
Will this app work even if connectivity is poor?
Will this app work effectively across various devices?
Those are very, very important questions.
So in other words, as the title suggests,
how do we create apps that are fit for India?
That's going to be the focus of this discussion today.
Let's move forward.
And let's quickly look at the opportunity
that we see on Android.
Super exciting.
Canalys, which is a leading research firm,
predicts that in just over two years from now,
India will have about half a billion smartphone users.
And as you can see, from the green bar right there,
Android will be at the forefront of that revolution.
Right.
So clearly, the challenge does not lie in users
or getting enough users for content.
The challenge could be in making sure
that the content that you create is engaging
enough and impactful enough.
There are three challenges that we
need to think deeply about, as we think about delivering
an excellent user experience.
Let's talk about the first one.
The first one is related to mobile connections because
of connectivity in this country.
Unfortunately, the average connection speed, or even
the peak average connection speed,
tends to be among the lowest, in this country, globally.
And that's something which impacts user experience
and, therefore, should be an input into your own app
development lifecycle.
Let's talk about the second challenge.
And that relates to the quality and adoption
of broadband in India.
Interesting stat-- just 11%.
Just 11% of all of the broadband connections
in the country, today, operate at speeds greater than 4 Mbps.
And even a smaller percentage operate
at speeds greater than 10 Mbps.
So clearly, I think all of these factors
influence the kind of user experience
and the kind of data consumption that you
can drive through your apps.
Let's talk about the third challenge
that we need to take into account, which
is about affordability of data.
The relative cost of data, as measured by cost
as a percentage of per capita national income, in India,
is high compared to some other markets in the region.
Even a market like Singapore, for example,
is eight times cheaper when you look at relative data
cost for mobile data-- for mobile broadband--
and 12 times cheaper when it comes to mobile data.
So clearly, there is work to be done, to make data
more affordable, and at the same time, work
to be done in creating content that works effectively
despite all these challenges.
So what do you want to do?
Our vision is really to help you work through these challenges
and create apps that will work effectively
despite these conditions.
Apps that will empower the next wave
of online users in the country.
Apps that will build trust and confidence among users.
And clearly, apps that will deliver a seamless, consistent
experience, regardless of devices,
regardless of connectivity.
That's what our goal is.
So how do you do this?
It's a nice, noble thought to have.
How do you do this?
What we've done is, essentially, worked with a lot of experts,
both within Google as well as outside,
to come up with a list of practices and guidelines
that we believe are important for you
to take into account as you think about getting fit
for India.
So essentially, what we've done is
we've identified a set of benchmarks and best practices
across connectivity, compatibility, and cost,
and essentially identified certain tools and procedures
that you should be taking into account, into your app
development cycle.
To tell you more about this, I'm going
to invite Ankur Kotwal from the developer advocate team
at Google, to take you through this, in more detail.
Please welcome Ankur.