Profile - research2guidance · ©research2guidance | October 2013 Single User License 5 CP-Tool Profile: Xamarin (by Xamarin) 1. XAMARIN IN A NUTSHELL Xamarin, of the same name as

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Service offering evaluation and user rating

October 2013

XamarinProfile


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CP-Tool Profile: Xamarin (by Xamarin)

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Xamarin in a nutshell .......................................................................................................... 5

2. About this profile ................................................................................................................ 6

3. Scope of Xamarin’s service offering .................................................................................... 7

3.1. Device class and platform support and feature availability ........................................... 7

3.2. Target user groups and industries ................................................................................ 10

3.3. Estimated familiarization and development time ........................................................ 12

3.4. Xamarin offered support services ................................................................................. 13

4. User rating of Xamarin service offering ............................................................................ 14

4.1. User profiles and usage frequency ............................................................................... 14

4.2. Targeted industries and preferred app categories by Xamarin users .......................... 15

4.3. Xamarin complexity evaluation ..................................................................................... 17

4.4. Achieved time savings ................................................................................................... 18

4.5. User satisfaction with platform, API and HW support .................................................. 19

4.6. User satisfaction with Xamarin´s support service ......................................................... 23

4.7. User satisfaction with app quality ................................................................................. 24

4.8. Cost-performance rating of Xamarin ............................................................................ 25

5. Strengths and challenges .................................................................................................. 27

6. Appendix ........................................................................................................................... 28

6.1. Benchmarking methodology ......................................................................................... 28

6.2. About the authors ......................................................................................................... 31

6.3. List of figures and tables ............................................................................................... 32




1. XAMARIN IN A NUTSHELL

Xamarin, of the same name as its vendor, is a suite for cross-platform development and

deployment. It consists of Xamarin Studio, Xamarin.Android, Xamarin.iOS (formerly Mono

Touch), Xamarin.Mac including test cloud services, libraries and documentation.

Xamarin is built for professional mobile apps developers. Xamarin will be able to help developers publish mobile apps on tablets and smartphones as well as newer types of target devices like smart TVs or in-car devices. Xamarin is not suited for developers who want to build apps for feature phones or game consoles. With a wealth of APIs Xamarin gives professional developers a lot of options for their apps. In addition to the many APIs Xamarin offers a lot of hardware feature access.

Claim: “We have one of the highest customer satisfaction rates among all of the cross-

platform tools.”

USP: “Access to 100% of the native iOS and Android APIs - anything that can be done on

Objective-C and Java can be done in Xamarin in C#. Developers building apps with Xamarin

get fully native user experiences and performance with no compromises, and also get all of

the advantages of sharing code across device platforms (on average 75%).”

Reported number of developers: 375.000+

Reported number of apps: Not disclosed

Reference apps:

Pricing: License per seat using the solution

Starter: Free

Indie: US$ 300 / year

Business: US$ 1.000 / year

Enterprise: US$ 1.900 / year

Address: 430 Pacific Ave, San Francisco, CA 94133 (USA)

LabView TouchDraw Infinite Flight




2. ABOUT THIS PROFILE

This benchmarking report provides a “360-degree view” on Xamarin. It matches the

perspective of the vendor with the experience of Xamarin’s users.

The benchmarking results are based on two research projects conducted between May and

August 2013.

The first project examined the features of the tools and the additional service offerings of

the vendors. Research2guidance invited 90 cross-platform tool vendors, including Xamarin,

to provide company and tool information with the help of an online survey.

At the same time, users have been invited to share their experience with these tools. The

analysis asked for feedback on 16 dimensions including tool awareness, quality and

performance. The global online survey received over 1,000 responses from app developers

and publishers.

Xamarin has been one of the most rated tools. This report aggregates all information about

Xamarin into a comprehensive profile.

To allow the comparison of the Xamarin with similar CP Tools, the report also contrasts the

user ratings for Xamarin with the industry benchmark.

The report aims at giving a comprehensive decision support for the selection process of a CP

Tool that includes Xamarin.




3. SCOPE OF XAMARIN’S SERVICE OFFERING

Xamarin is a Cross Platform IDE1 Tool that allows native and web app publishing on a large

range of mobile and “non-mobile” platforms.

The description of the service offering is structured into 4 areas:

Device class and platform support and feature availability

The number of supported device classes and platforms is an indicator for the multi-

platform capability of a CP Tool. The variety of offered features determines the scope

of options when creating an app and it critically affects the app user experience.

Target user groups and industries

Some CP Tools have a focus on specific industries. Beyond an industrial focus, CP

Tools can target different user types according to company size or user profession.

Estimation of familiarization and development time

One of the major claims of CP Tools is to accelerate the app creation process. The

lower the complexity of a CP Tool, the faster a new user will be able to handle the

tool and start his app project.

Support service offerings

A good documentation and support can be a clear benefit of a CP Tool. CP Tools offer

different support channels. The quality of the service provided, is key differentiation

factor.

The description of the service offerings is based on information submitted by Xamarin.

3.1. DEVICE CLASS AND PLATFORM SUPPORT AND FEATURE AVAILABILITY

Xamarin is optimized for targeting smartphones, tablets and desktop for Windows and Mac.

Furthermore, it allows the development of apps that are optimized for smart TVs and in-car

devices.

Benchmark: Compared to other CP Tools, Xamarin belongs to the solutions which offer the

broadest device coverage.

1 CP IDE: Tools that allow multi-app/multi-platform app development. Most tools concentrate their output on native apps

but some also create web apps. These tools use their own SDK to develop a single code faster and compile it to meet native requirements.




Table 1: Device class optimization of Xamarin

CP Tools aim to support various platforms. This applies not only for device classes, but also

for operating systems, mobile as well as stationary.

Xamarin supports iOS, Android, Windows Phone as well as desktop, Mac and HTML

(targeting mobile). Support for additional platforms in the near future has not been

announced.

Interestingly, Xamarin does not support Blackberry and does not plan on doing so in the

foreseeable future.

Table 2: Xamarin - platform support

Benchmark: Xamarin’s native platform coverage is in line with the CP Tools in the IDE2 class.

Xamarin’s support for HTML 5 stands out, as only 4 out of 17 CP IDE Tools offer apps for

HMTL 5 (mobile).

If a CP Tool supports a particular platform, the accessibility of specific device hardware

features and pre-installed applications is of interest. It is an indicator for the quality of the

platform support.

For the supported platforms, Xamarin allows access to all the device hardware features

shown below: accelerometer, GPS, vibration, camera, multi-touch, landscape orientation,

microphone, speaker, compass, speaker and NFC.

2 IDE: Integrated Development Environment, see Cross Platform App Development Benchmarking Report for a detailed

description of CP Tool categories

Device class Optimization

Smartphones X

Tablets X

Desktop / PC X

Smart TVs X

In-car devices X

Feature phones

Game consoles

Smar

t TV

s

X X X X X X X

mobile OSdesktop

OSother




Accessibility of pre-installed is comprehensive for all iOS, Android and Windows: contacts,

filesystem IO, calendar, image library, in-app email, SMS etc.

Xamarin claims: “Our binding technology exposes all of the APIs available in iOS and Android

to your applications as regular C# class libraries. This means your Xamarin application can do

anything a platform, or device, offers, with native user interface and excellent performance.”

Table 3: Accessible device hardware features and pre-installed applications

Benchmark: With this feature richness and broad device class and platform support,

Xamarin is one of the most versatile cross-platform tools in the benchmarking.

Ready-made APIs allow the integration of functionalities, such as in-app advertising, in-app

purchase or social networks access, into mobile apps. The availability of ready-made APIs is a

quality indicator for platform support.

Xamarin offers broad integration of APIs, like analytics, advertising, mobile payment, billing

and social network integration, integration of enterprise applications and remote

monitoring.

Benchmark: Compared to the other CP IDE Tools, Xamarin offers the broadest set of

supported APIs. Xamarin offers the integration of all APIs that have been researched for this

report. Only one other tool (Appery.io) can claim to offer this many API options.

Accelerometer X X X X

GPS X X X X

Vibration X X X X

Camera X X X X

Multi touch/ Gesture X X X X

Landscape orientation X X X X

Compass X X X X

Speaker X X X X

Microfone X X X X

NFC X X X X

Contacts X X X X

Fi lesystem IO X X X X

Calendar X X X X

Image l ibrary X X X X

In-app emai l X X X X

Phone X X X X

SMS X X X X

MMS X X X X

Speech recognition X X X X

Maps X X X X

Accessible device hardware features

Accessible pre-installed applications




Table 4: Integration of APIs

3.2. TARGET USER GROUPS AND INDUSTRIES

Xamarin, like the majority of the observed tools, is not designed to develop apps for a

specific industry sector or app category.

Xamarin reference apps come from various industries like media apps (Rdio), utilities

(LabView, TouchDraw) and games (Draw A Stickman, Infinite Flight).

Integration

VOIP X

SMS X

MMS X

Social network access (e.g. Facebook) X

Advertising in apps (e.g. Inmobi)

X

Billing (e.g. credit card or operator billing)

X

Mobile payment (e.g. Paypal)/ In-app

payment X

Access to commerce platforms (e.g.

Magento) X

X

X

X

X

mHealth monitoring X

Remote monitoring: home energy X

Remote monitoring: entertainment X

Remote monitoring: home security X

Access to enterprise software (SAP, Oracle, etc.)

Monitoring

API

Communication

Commerce

Location based services (maps, routes, traffic)

App analytics (e.g. Distimo)

Text-to-speech transformation




Table 5: Target industries by Xamarin

Xamarin targets professional developers of all company sizes. It requires a background in

C++.

Benchmark: In terms of targeted company size, Xamarin is in line with the majority of the

tools researched for this report.

Industry Focus

General X

Utilities

Games

Retail

Hotels/ gastronomy

News/ Media

Sports

Medical/ health

IT

Financial

Education

Automotives

Heavy Industries

Aerospace/ defense

Government

Enterprise apps




Table 6: Xamarin – targeted company sizes and user types

3.3. ESTIMATED FAMILIARIZATION AND DEVELOPMENT TIME

The necessary time to learn to handle a CP Tool is an indicator for its complexity. The

average app development time mainly is an indicator for the complexity of app projects that

are realized with a CP Tool.

Xamarin claims that it takes weeks to learn to handle their SDK and an average application

take only days to develop. According to the necessary time to learn, Xamarin quite well

estimates the complexity of their tool.

Benchmark: Compared to the average app development time claimed by the vendors

themselves, Xamarin is in line with most of the other tools.

By stating that their users´ average app project have a duration of months, Xamarin

estimates the complexity of their users´ app projects of quite short length.

Benchmark: According to estimated app development time, Xamarin is in line with most CP

Tool vendors.

Availability

Consumers

Small X

Medium X

Enterprise X

Professional Developer X

Novice Developers

IT/ Telco Administrator

Business Administartor / CXO /

Management

Graphic Designers

Web developers /

web publishers

Non-Developers / Anyone

Other targeted

professions

Targeted Company Size

Targeted Profession

Target Group




Table 7: Complexity of Xamarin in terms of time-to-learn and average app development

time (vendor´s view)

3.4. XAMARIN OFFERED SUPPORT SERVICES

Xamarin offers all major support channels, except personal phone support. Support is only

provided in English.

Table 8: Xamarin - available support channels

Benchmark: Xamarin support services include more channels than average.

Complexity Indicator

Days

Weeks X

Months

Days X

Weeks

C#

Average app development time

Required programming skills

Parameter Value

Time-to-learn

Support channel Availablility

On-site project support X

On-site training/ tutorials X

Personal phone contact

Real time online support X

Time-delayed online support X

Online community X

Support available in languages:




4. USER RATING OF XAMARIN SERVICE OFFERING

The user rating is based on the results of the global online survey with more than 1.000

participants, evaluating more than 90 CP Tools. Out of the total ratings, 31 developers and

publishers have shared their experience with Xamarin.

4.1. USER PROFILES AND USAGE FREQUENCY

The user profile is an indicator for which user types a CP Tool is appropriate.

Xamarin users are mainly professional developers (85%). Xamarin is mainly used by single

developers and small companies, but have also users working for enterprises.

Figure 1: Xamarin users by company size and position

The usage intensity of a CP Tool shows how often a developer uses a CP Tool to deliver an

app project. It is a good indicator for how the requirements of the applications can be

realized with a specific CP Tool. This applies the more with increasing number and diversity

of projects a user conducts.

On average, Xamarin users developed 9 apps in the last twelve months.

Source: Global Cross Platform Tool Benchmarking 2013© research2guidance | 2013

Xamarin is used by all company sizes from single developers to enterprises

Xamarin:User by company size

Just Me32%

Small business

48%

Medium business

12%

Enterprise8%

User by position in the company

Professional developer

85%

Business administrator/ Management

8%

Graphic designer

3%

Other4%




Benchmark: Output quantity of apps of Xamarin users is below average for CP IDEs (across

all CP IDEs the average is 14 apps).

More than half of Xamarin users developed more than 50% of their apps with Xamarin. 26%

of users developed exclusively with Xamarin.

Benchmark: In terms of CP Tool usage intensity, Xamarin users are in line with other users of

CP IDE Tools in the benchmarking.

Figure 2: Xamarin users - total number of published apps and share of Xamarin apps

4.2. TARGETED INDUSTRIES AND PREFERRED APP CATEGORIES BY XAMARIN

USERS

Selecting the right CP Tool also depends on the industry and app category the app publisher

wants to target. CP Tools sometimes offer industry or app category-specific features like

design templates or interfaces to standard software packages that are commonly used

within an industry.

The comparison for which industries app developer make use of a CP Tool is a good indicator

for the quality of the industry-specific features of a CP Tool.


45% are just occasional users of Xamarin

Xamarin users:Total no. of published apps in the last 12 months

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

Share of apps developed with Phone Gap in the last 12 months in %

Intensity of usage

55% Specialists

45% Occsional users

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

45%

0 1-3 4-10 11-20 21-100

# of apps developed in the last 12 months

ᴓ = 9 apps ᴓ = 55%




Xamarin is used to mainly develop apps for the following industries: retail utilities, transport

and logistics, news/ info/ media, healthcare and pharma, IT, games, sports, food and

beverage, financial and oil and gas.

Figure 3: Xamarin users - industry focus when using Xamarin

The spectrum of app categories which Xamarin users developed apps for is also broad.

Utilities, productivity, business and travel are the most common app categories.

Benchmark: Xamarin’s targeted app categories differ from most of the other CP IDE Tools as

users don’t use the tool to develop games as much as users from other tools.


Xamarin is a generalist, suitable to target various industriesXamarin:Industry focus when using Xamarin

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

INDUSTRY FOCUS




Figure 4: Xamarin users´ app category focus when using Xamarin

Hence, Xamarin keeps the claim to be an “allrounder” tool. Users have a broad spectrum of

target markets when developing with it.

On average, Xamarin users target 2-3 app categories.

Benchmark: The app category spread matches the results for Phone Gap, JQuery Mobile and

Titanium. Users of CP Tools with designated industry focus, such as Unity 3D and

Marmalade, each on average just targeted 1-2 categories.

4.3. XAMARIN COMPLEXITY EVALUATION

Xamarin claims that it takes not more than weeks to learn to handle their tool (s.a.).

The results of the benchmarking indicate that Xamarin is right with this statement.

62% of Xamarin users managed to handle the tool within days. Xamarin is one of the few

tools in the benchmarking that could be mastered by such a big share of users in this short

amount of time.

For most tools in the benchmarking this was not the case. Probably driven by the intention

to present the simplicity of their solution, vendors of CP Tools often have been too

enthusiastic regarding complexity and learning time.




Average development time for an app created with Xamarin is measured in weeks. But there

are also 35% of app projects taking months rather than weeks.

Benchmark: Across all CP Tools 25% of app projects took days, 46% weeks and 25% months.

The vast majority of Xamarin’s users rate the complexity of the tools as moderate or low.

Benchmark: The complexity of Xamarin, as perceived by the users, averages the

benchmarking results.

Figure 5: Complexity of Xamarin in terms of time-to-learn and average app development

time (users view); Complexity rating

4.4. ACHIEVED TIME SAVINGS

CP Tools are designed to reduce app development time for multi- platform publishing.

Against the background of the normal project length is the time saving, made possible by the

use of the CP Tool, an important indicator of the quality of the tool.

Xamarin users do confirm that they have realized significant time savings against standard

app development approaches. 84% of Xamarin users realized time-savings of 30% and more


Xamarin is of medium complexity compared to other CP Tools

Xamarin: Complexity in terms of „Familiarization time“ and „Average app development time“User rating: Complexity

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Average app development time

Familiarization time

Days Weeks Months

0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%

Complexity rating

Low Average High

COMPLEXITYJust a few hours with

previous knowledge of .NET and Android/iOS.

Using Xamarian.Mono for Android you can use MS

Visual Studio 2010 or 2012. Work perfectly, no Need to learn a new development

environment




compared to developing with native SDK. Time-savings of more than 50% have been realized

by 53% of users.

16% of Xamarin users claim to not have been able to shorten their app development time.

Benchmark: Time savings with Xamarin are similar to those that have been achieved with

Corona SDK and Unity 3D. Time savings with Xamarin are above average.

Figure 6: Realized time-savings in app development with Xamarin

4.5. USER SATISFACTION WITH PLATFORM, API AND HW SUPPORT

Xamarin users mainly target iOS and Android, further Windows 8 and Phone. Windows for

desktop and Mac are the least targeted.

Satisfaction with the Xamarin platform support (90% of users) is high.

Benchmark: Satisfaction level of Xamarin’s platform coverage is above average in the

benchmarking. However, higher satisfaction levels have been reached by JQuery Mobile,

Unity 3D and Marmalade (95% of satisfied users).


Only 16% of Xamarin users did not realize any time savings with the tool

Xamarin: Realized time savings in app development

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

50%+faster

50%faster

40%faster

30%faster

20%faster

10%faster

0%faster

10%slower

20%slower

30%slower

40%slower

50%slower

TIME SAVINGS

SlowerFaster

High: 84% Moderate: 0% No time savings: 16%

It depends on your architecture mostly and not only on the tool. I coud move an app's backend from Windows 8 RT to Android literally within hours, but only because I structured it from the beginning having in mind to target different

platforms. UI is more complex though

Development is faster, but significant time spent trying to

improve startup time... eventually rewriting native.

Cross platform development in a platform (.NET) that I already

mastered with all the benifts it brings over Java or ObjectiveC.




Figure 7: Targeted platforms by Xamarin users; satisfaction with platform support

Availability of cloud API services (e.g. operator billing, in-app advertisement, app analytics or

shop systems), accessibility of device hardware features (e.g. microphone, camera, speaker)

and pre-installed applications (e.g. calendar, address book) help to manage the app lifecycle,

ease the development process and/or allow the creation of sophisticated apps in terms of

functionalities as well as look-and-feel.

Access to APIs is for most of Xamarin users a nice-to-have feature.

Only 24% of Xamarin users rate access to e.g. SMS, analytics ad billing as “critical”.

Benchmark: Xamarin user API access importance rating is below average across users of CP

Tools.

Not surprisingly, the majority of Xamarin users only “rarely” or “never” make use of these

features.

Benchmark: Xamarin user API usage is below average across users of CP Tools.

Even though API services are not being used very often by the users, the major share of

users is happy with the offer.

Benchmark: Service satisfaction with cloud API services among Xamarin users is among the

highest in the benchmarking.


Satisfaction with platform support is above average among Xamarin users

Xamarin: Targeted OS, platform support satisfaction

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Android iOs Windows 8 Windows(desktop)

WindowsPhone

Html(targetingmobile)

Html(targetingdesktop)

OS X(desktop)

TARGETED OS

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Satisfaction with platform support

Satisfied Unsatisfied

Mono for Android Targets only Android. But I could reuse my

.NET code from Windows Desktop and

Windows 8




Figure 8: Importance, usage and satisfaction with Xamarin cloud API services

Access to device hardware features is rated critical by 67% of Xamarin users.

64 % of Xamarin users use hardware features, like microphone, speaker or camera, at least

sometimes in turns their app projects.

The majority of users is “satisfied” with the support Xamarin offers.

Benchmark: Xamarin users regard access to device hardware features slightly more

important than CP Tool users on average. Satisfaction with the service as well is above

average.


Service satisfaction with cloud API services is highest among Xamarin users

Xamarin cloud API services: Importance, usage intensity and service satisfaction

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Usage Intensity

Intensely Often Sometimes Rarely Never

CLOUD API SERVICES

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Service satisfaction

Very satisfied Satisfied Neutral

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Importance

Critical Nice to have Not relevant




Figure 9: Importance, usage and satisfaction with Xamarin accessible device hardware

features

The accessibility of pre-installed applications is rated “critical” by 47% of users.

60% of Xamarin users at least use pre-installed apps sometimes.

Benchmark: Usage intensity of Xamarin access features for e.g. calendar or contact book

integration is second highest in the benchmarking. Only Phone Gap has more “intense” or

“often” users of this feature.

Satisfaction level is high. 72% of user are “very satisfied” or “satisfied” with the app support

of Xamarin.

Benchmark: Service satisfaction among Xamarin users is the highest in the benchmarking.

Overall satisfaction with all three features, availability of cloud API services, accessible device

hardware features and pre-installed applications is above average.


Satisfaction with accessibility of device hardware features is above average

Xamarin accessible device hardware features: Importance, usage intensity and service satisfaction

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Usage intensity


DEVICE HW FEATURES

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%



0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Importance





Figure 10: Importance, usage and satisfaction with Xamarin accessible pre-installed

applications

4.6. USER SATISFACTION WITH XAMARIN´S SUPPORT SERVICE

Support services help to solve problems that occur during app projects. For all CP Tools, and

in particular for those of high complexity, a helping support service increases their

attractiveness. The variety of offered support channels and even more the satisfaction level

with the support services are indicators for the quality of the customer service of a CP Tool.

Online community and time-delayed online support are most frequently used by Xamarin

developers.

93% of Xamarin users rate the support “good” or “very good”.

Benchmark: Satisfaction with the support service is the highest in the benchmarking.

Xamarin user on the user support: “Very good isn't enough. Amazing comes close.”


Satisfaction with accessibility of pre-installed applications among Xamarin users is highest in the benchmarking

Xamarin accessible pre-installed applications: Importance, usage intensity and service satisfaction

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Usage intensity


PRE-INSTALLED APPS

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%



0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Importance





Figure 11: Usage of Xamarin support channels and support service satisfaction

4.7. USER SATISFACTION WITH APP QUALITY

An important indicator for the performance of the different CP Tools is the quality of the

apps that have been developed with the help of a CP Tool. The quality of an app depends on

the graphical standard, the usability, the performance, the revenue potential and how

secure the app is against threats from viruses, data theft etc.

The quality of apps that have been developed with Xamarin is rated as high. This rating

refers to the revenue potential, security, performance, usability and design features.

App revenue potential is rated same or higher by more the 80% of the users.

Performance of Xamarin apps have been rated by 74% of users as native-like. Although

performance is their major weakness, Xamarin apps received second best ratings in the

benchmarking according to this characteristic.

89% of Xamarin users rate the usability of their apps as native-like.

100% of Xamarin users rate the security as native-like or even better.

89% of Xamarin user rate design quality of their apps same or better than native apps.


Online-communities and time-delayed online support are the most frequently support channels

Xamarin support:Usage and service satisfaction

SUPPORT

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

Online community Time-delayedonline support

On-site training /tutorials

Real-time onlinesupport

On-site projectsupport

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%


Very good Good Average

Very good isn't enough. Amazing comes close.




Benchmark: Xamarin apps are among the best rated apps in the benchmarking for app

quality.

Figure 12: Xamarin app quality rating

4.8. COST-PERFORMANCE RATING OF XAMARIN

Cost-performance ratio is an overall indicator of how efficient app developers rate the CP

Tool-supported development and publishing process of an app.

Xamarin offers price tiers for all kinds of users, from starters to enterprises. This pricing for

the Xamarin suite seems to be well suited for Xamarin clients.

Xamarin users rate the cost-performance ratio high. 44% of all Xamarin users rate the cost-

performance ratio as ”good value”.

Benchmark: Overall cost-performance rating is above average tool rating.


Xamarin apps are among the best apps in the benchmarking

Xamarin app quality rating vs. native apps

-40% -20% 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%

Design

Usability

Performance

Security

Generated app revenues

Same or higher Lower Much lower

APP QUALITY

Startup take a Little bit longer, thats where the Performance is lower, if the app is running

there is no difference to notice

Its the same as native. But you can reuse.

Development is faster, but significant time spent trying to improve startup time...

eventually rewriting native.




Figure 13: Xamarin - cost-performance ratio (user rating)


Cost-performance ratio of Xamarin is rated best across all observed CP Tools.

Xamarin: User rating of cost-performance ratio

Good value44%

Okay56%

COST-PERFORMANCE RATIO

Great Integration with Visual Studio




5. STRENGTHS AND CHALLENGES

User rating of Xamarin is overall positive: compared to the industry benchmark, the

following strengths and weaknesses can be drawn from the feedback of Xamarin and CP Tool

users.

Strengths:

Very high user satisfaction with cost-performance ratio

Access to many device types

Versatile app categories and industries targetable

API and feature richness

Very high quality of user support

High time savings

High app quality

Challenges:

No BlackBerry support

Background in professional development required

Xamarin is a clear “allrounder”. The tool is suited for a broad variety of mobile app projects

and target smart TVs and in-car devices as well. Xamarin claims to have the highest user

satisfaction among CP Tools. These results indicate that user satisfaction with Xamarin is in

fact among the best in the CP Tool landscape. Tool complexity is acceptable, documentation

is good, the support services are excellent, app quality is high. According to the

benchmarking results, Xamarin is the tool of choice when looking for a generalist CP IDE that

requires C++.




6. APPENDIX

6.1. BENCHMARKING METHODOLOGY

The profile is an excerpt from the Global Cross-Platform App Development Tool

Benchmarking.

This benchmarking of cross-platform development tools is based on two research projects

conducted between May and August 2013.

The vendor analysis examines the tool features, USPs3 of the solutions, penetration and the

service offering of the vendors. Research2guidance invited 90 cross-platform tool vendors to

provide company and tool information with the help of an online survey. More than 50% of

invited vendors participated, making it the largest cross-platform tool survey to date. Survey

results have been enriched with expert interviews and secondary research.

Figure 14: Benchmarking methodology

User awareness and performance rating is based on a global app developer and publisher

online survey. The online survey received over 1.000 responses.

3 USP: Unique Selling Proposition


The benchmarking matches the tool vendors viewwith the reality of the users

Vendor survey

User survey

Benchmarking

• 45 tools vendors have participated

• Vendors filled out questionaires about their solution

• 1,021 app developers have participated

• Developers answered surveyabout their experience withcross platform tools

• Matching vendor and tool user perspectives

• Tool comparison

1

2

3

Benchmarking process




Tool vendor offerings and user ratings are matched in the benchmarking, indicating gaps

between vendors and user perception of today’s leading cross-platform app development

tools.

Cross-platform tool users are located in regions around the world. Participants come mainly

from the US (15%), Canada (11%), India (11%), Germany (10%) and UK (6%).

Figure 15: Geographical overview of cross-platform tool users

Tool user survey participants range from individual app developers to IT managers of multi-

national corporations.


Geographical distribution of participating developers

Tool users are spread around the globe




Figure 16: Background of cross-platform tool users


The cross-platform rating audience ranges from individual developers to IT managers of multi-national corporations

User survey participants by company size

Just me33%

Small business

41%

Medium business

13%

Enterprise13%

n=888

User survey participants by position in thecompany

Professional developer

58%

Business administrator

/ CXO / Management

21%

IT / telecom administrator

5%

Graphic designer

2%

Student / Learning

developer2%

Other12%




6.2. ABOUT THE AUTHORS

The authors of this report have been following the app market and CP Tools for many years.

The first report on multi-platform app publishing tools was published in 2010. Since then,

two other reports which cover the market for CP Tools have been published.

OUR ANALYST TEAM

Ralf-Gordon Jahns

Ralf is the research director of

research2guidance. He has worked for

more than 19 years in the telecom and

media industry. Prior to

research2guidance he worked as a

partner for Capgemini Telecom Media &

Networks. Ralf is a frequent keynote

speaker on mobile industry events,

publisher of a multitude of mobile

market reports and executive

consultant of more than 30 clients in

the telecom and media industry.

Joachim Thiele-Schlesier

Joachim is a research analyst at

research2guidance. He is monitoring the

CP Tool market since 2011 and has been

responsible for publishing 3 reports on

this topic. Joachim also engaged with

projects on converging

telecommunication networks and

regulatory issues. He holds a degree in

economics and specializes on

infrastructure and network economics.

Prior to research2guidance he worked for

Markedskraft ASA as analyst and for the

Fraunhofer Institute for Open

Communication Systems and Center for

Network Industries.




6.3. LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES

Table 1: Device class optimization of Xamarin ........................................................................... 8

Table 2: Xamarin - platform support .......................................................................................... 8

Table 3: Accessible device hardware features and pre-installed applications .......................... 9

Table 4: Integration of APIs ...................................................................................................... 10

Table 5: Target industries by Xamarin...................................................................................... 11

Table 6: Xamarin – targeted company sizes and user types .................................................... 12

Table 7: Complexity of Xamarin in terms of time-to-learn and average app development time

(vendor´s view) ......................................................................................................................... 13

Table 8: Xamarin - available support channels ........................................................................ 13

Figure 1: Xamarin users by company size and position ........................................................... 14

Figure 2: Xamarin users - total number of published apps and share of Xamarin apps .......... 15

Figure 3: Xamarin users - industry focus when using Xamarin ................................................ 16

Figure 4: Xamarin users´ app category focus when using Xamarin ......................................... 17

Figure 5: Complexity of Xamarin in terms of time-to-learn and average app development

time (users view); Complexity rating ....................................................................................... 18

Figure 6: Realized time-savings in app development with Xamarin ........................................ 19

Figure 7: Targeted platforms by Xamarin users; satisfaction with platform support ............. 20

Figure 8: Importance, usage and satisfaction with Xamarin cloud API services ...................... 21

Figure 9: Importance, usage and satisfaction with Xamarin accessible device hardware

features .................................................................................................................................... 22

Figure 10: Importance, usage and satisfaction with Xamarin accessible pre-installed

applications .............................................................................................................................. 23

Figure 11: Usage of Xamarin support channels and support service satisfaction ................... 24

Figure 12: Xamarin app quality rating ...................................................................................... 25

Figure 13: Xamarin - cost-performance ratio (user rating) ...................................................... 26

Figure 14: Benchmarking methodology ................................................................................... 28

Figure 15: Geographical overview of cross-platform tool users .............................................. 29

Figure 16: Background of cross-platform tool users ................................................................ 30

Documents

Profile - research2guidance · ©research2guidance | October 2013 Single User License 5 CP-Tool Profile: Xamarin (by Xamarin) 1. XAMARIN IN A NUTSHELL Xamarin, of the same name as