Mobile App Development Platform offers global reach.

Press Release Summary:



Based on 3 components, Kii Platform helps mobile App Store entrepreneurs monetize and grow their business. Kii Cloud offers suite of scalable back-end cloud services including user management, data management, analytics, and mobile advertising. Kii Capital provides early stage investment fund focused on app segment of smartphone market, while Kii Partners offers access to distribution network of Asian mobile operators and OEMs.



Original Press Release:



Kii Corporation Launches Kii Platform for Mobile App Developers



The industry's first one-stop-shop for cloud services, funding, and Asian distribution helps App Store entrepreneurs accelerate global business success

SAN MATEO, Calif. and BARCELONA, Spain, -- MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS -- Kii Corporation (www.kii.com) is making its official debut today at Mobile World Congress with a unique offering for mobile app developers. The company's core service offering, Kii Platform, combines cloud technology (Kii Cloud), distribution through Asian OEMs and operators (Kii Partners) and an early stage investment fund (Kii Capital) for accelerating App Store entrepreneurs into successful global businesses. Kii currently reaches over 40 million end users around the world through its network of developer partners.

"Building a successful App business is incredibly difficult because most developers are already feeling overburdened by the pressure to maintain a high ranking in app stores. As a result, capitalizing, marketing and monetizing it in different geographies and capturing what needs to be improved to make it successful, is beyond the skills and capabilities of most of them," said Rob Enderle, Principal Analyst for the Enderle Group. "The Kii Platform provides the resources developers need and a collaborative infrastructure where people new to this segment can learn from the successes and mistakes of others."

The Kii Platform is made up of three pillars:

Kii Cloud: A suite of scalable back-end cloud services including user management, data management, analytics and mobile advertising. Through Kii's developer portal, developers can quickly and easily persist data for millions of users without writing a single line of server code. With similar ease developers can improve app monetization by including the Kii Ad SDK. Kii supports smartphone developers using any major platform but offers special native SDK support for Apple IOS and Android development.

Kii Capital: An early stage investment fund focused on the app segment of the fast growing smartphone market. The fund targets mobile application developers looking to scale their business globally through recruiting, marketing, product development and monetization strategies, among other services needed to expedite growth.

Kii Partners: Access to a distribution network of highly coveted Asian mobile operators and OEMs in Japan, China, Korea and Taiwan, as well as Silicon Valley, who offer pre-loading as well as co-marketing opportunities for select apps.

"App Store success creates new challenges: raising money, hiring server engineers, and going global," said Masanari Arai, CEO and co-founder of Kii Corporation. "Through Kii Capital, Kii Cloud and Kii Partners we stand behind this new class of entrepreneur."

One beneficiary of the Kii Platform is Metago, developers of the ASTRO File Manager app, which has grown to more than 20M downloads in Android Market. Kii Capital was the first institutional investor in Metago, Kii Cloud is the foundation for the company's first subscription-based premium online service, ASTRO Backup, and Kii Partners helped Metago secure distribution deals with large Asian partners.

"When we first developed ASTRO File Manager we of course hoped it would become an instant success. But as our user base grew into the millions, we quickly realized that scaling and monetization was going to be a challenge," said Kevin Payne, CEO of Metago. "Partnering with Kii allowed us to expand our product offering to include cloud services and monetize in countries we had little reach in previously. It's a winning combination."

"The Kii Cloud infrastructure already serves tens of millions of users in Japan, but ASTRO rapidly doubled in size since the time of our investment," added Miko Matsumura, Senior Vice President Marketing and Developer Relations of Kii Corporation. "It's exciting to enable such a fast-growing premium online service, and we're looking forward to working with ASTRO on mobile advertising initiatives."

About Kii Corporation

Kii Corporation was formed in July 2010 as the result of the merger of Servo Software and Synclore Corporation, leaders in the mobile data synchronization and backup space. The company's core offering, Kii Platform, is a unique combination of cloud technology, distribution services and an early stage investment fund designed to help mobile app developers monetize and grow their business. Kii currently reaches over 40 million end users around the world through its network of developer partners. Kii is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan with offices in San Mateo, California and Shenzhen, China and today employs more than 100 engineers and business professionals around the world. For more information visit www.kii.com.

All Topics