One of the key message from Mobile World Congress of 2010 is that Mobile operators around the world are joining hands to sort the fragmentation issue on mobile phones. Some of the world’s largest  mobile operators have joined forces to launch this platform. once this platform is launched , this will create a so called wholesale application community. It will be able to combine 15 of the largest operators including  America Movil, At&T, T-Mobile, KT, NTT Docomo, Orange, Telecom Italia, Telefonica, Telenor, Telesonera, Sprint.  There are four more operators in the Joint Innovation Lab(JIL) mobile apps initiative Vodafone, China mobile, Softbank and Verizon wireless are also included. This group serves 3 billion mobile customers all over the world.

 With all this development questions are being asked if all this development means rest of the world against Apple that has its own well established apps store. Handset manufacturers like Sony Ericsson, LG and Samsung who do not have a significant apps business yet are supporting this operators led initiative.

The operators alliance is planning to use both JIL and OMTP’s  BONDI requirements initially and eventually evolving into a common standard within the next 12 months. It is not clear yet what it will do in terms of competition in apps business but it looks that it would address the so-called fragmented application market place. This initiative will also help operators to capture revenue generating apps business. It will be interesting to see how the developers who want to take advantage of this opportunity would re-adjust their development and marketing strategies before and after this opportunity is fully materialized in terms of the availability and finalization of the common standards.