Webmasters who want to get on board the mobile movement have a new friend. Specializing in the creation and management of Wireless Application Protocol sites—as well as billing integration and solutions deployment—up-and-coming U.K.-based company Wapple quickly is becoming the go-to provider for solid WAP applications.
Offering a unique set of WAP solutions, Wapple allows webmasters to create and manage their own WAP sites through its console. Alternatively, they can request a site be built to their particular specifications. What’s more, the Wapple system automatically supports a wide range of mobile devices—including Sony PlayStation Portables and other devices that are just now coming out.
Officially launched in May 2004, Wapple actually got its start nearly a year ago, when founder and Chief Executive Officer Rich Holdsworth and his business partner (who is also his life partner), Anne Thomas, began a small business as content providers. “Back in the very first days of mobile Internet here in the U.K., we started selling content to consumers, and basically we built up a number of services and developed the systems that would allow us to create lots of services very quickly and upload them through a Web-based interface,” Holdsworth recalls. “That went so well that many people said, ‘Oh, could you do this for us?’ So we decided to change focus and become purely a technology provider.”
Once they made the decision to “go techno,” the rest just fell into place, Holdsworth adds. “We developed systems even further, so that it was a Web-based console that anybody could log into and create services through. Now we’ve developed it to the point where you can go on the website and sign up for packages.”
Wapple’s series of solutions essentially give webmasters the power to branch out into a burgeoning faction of the industry through demystifying the process. Says Holdsworth, “We’ve taken it away from having to worry too much about the technical aspects of [mobile content distribution]. We’re really empowering any business or organization to take their content and quickly deploy it onto the mobile Internet.
“A webmaster probably has a Web team working for him, but once you’re creating on the mobile Internet, it’s a hell of a lot of work,” he continues. “There are so many pitfalls in terms of getting things working on a range of devices [that] it’s a massive undertaking to get any kind of mobile interface off the ground. What we allow people to do is literally buy a package, create a logo, upload a lot of pictures, upload a lot of videos, and start selling it immediately. We solved a lot of problems for people. It means they don’t have to worry about all the nasty programming they have to do [otherwise] to get their services up on the Internet.”
Holdsworth says the company’s origin in content production makes it unique. “We built [Wapple] from where we came from,” he says. “We were a content provider, rather than a Web-development team that got into mobile development. I think really it’s a unique approach to the way we allow people to create services.”
The company’s services are upgraded and improved frequently, Holdsworth notes. “We’re doing a lot now to make our services more user-focused, in the sense that there are more features,” he says. “We want to have a bigger variety of template options to choose from.”
In the meantime, he says, Wapple is focusing on providing “a good product at a very good price—and in a very close and personal way with people. We enjoy that. We like being helpful; we like getting people’s feedback. Knowing our customers—that’s a really important thing that we’re going to continue to do no matter what happens with this.”
Pictured: Rich Holdsworth and Anne Thomas of Wapple
