Dynamics Partners See Positives in Microsoft's Xamarin Acquisition

Another sign of the growing importance of mobile devices and applications can be seen in Microsoft's February announcement it was acquiring Xamarin, a platform provider for mobile app development. Xamarin has been used by more than 1.3 million developers, according to a release on the transaction. Business Insider recently listed it among "The 9 startups that secretly run the Internet."

Before the deal, Microsoft and Xamarin were already partners. Microsoft has incorporated Xamarin integration into Visual Studio, Microsoft Azure, Office 365, and the Enterprise Mobility Suite.

"It's great that Microsoft acquired a cross-platform development tool," says Jerry Weinstock, business technology strategist with CRM Innovation LLC, a Lenexa, Kansas-based partner focused on CRM consulting and implementation. "It emphasizes that mobile is important."

Business users' preference for mobile apps over mobile-friendly web sites is pronounced and growing, says Weinstock. Apps are more targeted than websites and require fewer taps before the user is accessing the information he or she needs, he adds.

The acquisition of Xamarin should make Microsoft's "world class developer tools and services even better with deeper integration and seamless mobile app dev experiences," according to a comment in the announcement by Scott Guthrie, executive vice president of Microsoft's cloud and enterprise group.

The acquisition also seems "to be in line with a larger cross-platform push at Microsoft," says Miroslav Pomsar. He heads software development with Resco, a developer of cross-platform mobile software solutions with headquarters in Chelsea, Massachusetts and Bratislava, Slovakia.

Partner impact

Partners see a number of positives in the acquisition. Resco, for instance has relied on Xamarin to ...