I was impressed by the Financial Times‘ HTML5 web app when it was unveiled last summer, not only because it circumvented Apple‘s 30% cut of revenues, but more importantly that it was beautiful and cross-platform from the outset. Now the FT has taken the move to acquire the developer of that app, Assanka.
Assanka has always seen the current divisive market for proprietary apps (iOS/Android/Windows) as a temporary solution and when pushed with Apple’s change of its terms, the Financial Times agreed. Other content providers have been slower to follow suit, but as they do they will now have one less team to look to for development as Assanka has gone in-house at the FT.
Assanka has already built some extra goodies for the FT – including a pre-installed app on the Samsung Galaxy Tab that is cleverly little more than offline storage and something to distribute through Samsung‘s app gallery, whilst all the heavy lifting is done in cross-platform HTML5 – but there will be more to come. With Assanka’s team on board, the FT can look to expand its digital services outside of simply access to the content already found on the web or in the printed paper – into being able to perform company comparisons and financial data calculations that would not have been possible without today’s toolset.
Congratulations to both Assanka and the FT on the deal.
[via TechCrunch]