prioritize development of iOS apps. “The Android app will always… play second fiddle to the iPhone until you start to see those absolute dollars start to matter more,” Aley says. “We see a 20 percent lift in conversion on iOS devices and a 35 percent increase in monetization lifetime value from our iOS folks versus Android.”
—Look for big players to win in mobile payments. Boris Wertz of Version One Ventures says this is complicated market, and it’s too early to call a winner. “I’m pretty sure we won’t see a startup coming around the corner and nailing the market,” he says. Instead, it will be an incumbent from the world of financial services, or a Google or Amazon, and in any case, it’s probably not winner take all, Wertz says.
—If all else fails—or even if it doesn’t—try nepotism. Buddy chief executive David McLauchlan shared how an entrepreneur can benefit from family ties, and not just through a friends and family seed round. The multi-platform app development “backend as a service” is found at buddy.com, a coveted Web domain that several older companies might have wanted. McLauchlan’s uncle happened to buy it in 1994 for $17.
