Mobile application pioneer Ideaworks3D Limited has announced a new brand umbrella for its native, cross-platform SDK (software development kit) and cross-platform application development and distribution services, Marmalade (http://www.madewithmarmalade.com/)

Also immediately available is Marmalade 5.0, the SDK that allows developers to write apps in standard C++ and deploy from this single code base as native applications to iOS, Android, WebOS and a range of other platforms. The new version incorporates an Extensions Development Kit (EDK) for developers to access any native APIs (application programming interfaces) they choose on iOS and Android, adding to features including multi-threading. 

While hard core cross-platform development has traditionally been the purview of specialist developers and large publishers, the mobile application development market is developing very rapidly. Tens of thousands of application developers now want to deploy their apps to multiple operating systems including iOS, Android, WebOS, Samsung Bada and device formats including smartphones, tablets, and soon, smart TVs. 

With consumers expecting the same application experience on every platform, mobile apps developers face a stark choice: develop natively for each OS platform with the cost and complexity of multiple codebases, or choose a web-based approach with compromises in performance and functionality. Marmalade has been solving this problem for high-end developers including Electronic Arts, Boeing, Activision and Konami, according to Marmalade CEO Niall Murphy. Now this technical advantage is available to any developer with Marmalade.

"A step change in mobile application development has taken place," says Murphy. "The market adoption of multiple device formats and operating systems is huge, and the need for developers to have their applications on many of them is now a reality. Developers who adopt smart cross-platform development strategies will win both in the economics and speed of their development, and the differentiation they are able to bring to their applications. Vision Mobile’s recent Developer Economics report shows that developers are targeting on average three platforms for each app, with the porting challenge number one in developers’ minds.”

Marmalade has active partnerships with all major OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) and platform providers.  A co-operation was announced with RIM in March, with Playbook support in Marmalade to be released during the summer. 
 
“With Marmalade, developers don’t have to choose between performance and portability," says Murphy. " It’s hugely exciting to see the great games, augmented reality and other location-based apps being created with Marmalade and deployed simultaneously to iOS, Android and beyond.”