If you search the Internet today trying to find an experienced iPhone developer you are going to be surprised. There are close to none that are available. It may sound ridiculous: there are almost 200,000 apps in the Apple iTunes App Store. Who made them all? Well, of course: developers. The problem is they are mostly already hired.
It reminds me of the 90s when the Internet was becoming popular and since all companies wanted to have their own web page, they were hiring students who knew a little bit of HTML to make their home pages. Web developers in the 90s were kings; it was very easy to find a good job. Fast-forward to now and you are free to choose from hundreds of thousands of companies around the world, millions of freelancers and zillions of unemployed HTML gurus.
Almost the same thing that happened 15 years ago is occurring now. All companies, from big oil businesses to your local bar, want to have a presence online - today this includes Twitter, Facebook, and of course they also want to have their own iPhone app. It is an image thing, it is a must - banks, restaurants, magazines, everyone wants to showcase their app. Every kid has a dream app, every IT entrepreneur has or had a brilliant idea for an app.
Developers who work for big corporations, releasing one update a month for their app are doing very well. In most cases we are talking about just creating or updating a UI to some existing corporate web presence, so not too much work to do, and they do receive a good salary.
Developers working for the companies that make the most popular apps on iTunes - the ones you can see on the “Top 100” list - are working day and night, many of them making very decent money in addition to owning stakes in the companies. Most might be in fact founders of their own companies.
So what is left for us, the entrepreneurs, who want to revolutionize the mobile space, but do not program ourselves? Well, we have to raise a lot of capital to be able to hire those people that are already working for stable positions. This is when we also need to be very convincing about our ideas, because money by far is not the most important part of the deal when you are trying to get someone to work for your startup and leave a stable position in a big corporation.
Or, as another option, we need to learn how to code ourselves. Well, let’s just say that this last option is not the most viable solution…
Nevertheless, I want to add that we are hiring. :-) Full-time position for Developers at our Miami-based startup, located in the Brickell area. We have a fantastic idea for the mobile social space, great people and secured funding. iPhone and Ruby on Rails developers, join us to change the world, I promise it will be more interesting than developing just an iPhone interface for boring online banking places. :-)
