Google Apps opens open-source marketplace

Today Google announced a marketplace that'll give third party developers the opportunity to sell   applications to businesses that use Google Apps. According to Google there are currently 25 million Apps users divided over 2 million companies and it's growing at fast pace. Up ´till now Apps mainly consisted of `GMail`and gmail-linked apps like `Talk` and ´Tasks´, ´Calendar´, ´Docs´, ´Discussion Groups', ´Sites´ and ´Video´.

The main advantages of Cloud-Computing are

• No more need to update/upgrade software
• Savings on IT maintenance
• No more need to back-up files on (external) data servers

These advantages combined with an open source platform where an unlimited amount of third party software can be offered, opens up the road to a potentially very powerful marketplace. 

At the start of the marketplace today there are already more than 50 businesses selling applications across a range of categories.

Example of Manymoon: a social productivity tool that simplifies your work life by letting you organize group projects, tasks, documents...  

From the official Google Blog

We've found that when businesses begin to experience the benefits of cloud computing, they want more. We're often asked when we'll offer a wider variety of business applications — from accounting and project management to travel planning and human resources management. But we certainly can't and won't do it all, and there are hundreds of business applications for which we have no particular expertise.
In recent years, many talented software providers have embraced the cloud and delivered a diverse set of features capable of powering almost any business. But too often, customers who adopt applications from multiple vendors end up with a fractured experience, where each particular application exists in its own silo. Users are often forced to create and remember multiple passwords, cut and paste data between applications, and jump between multiple interfaces just to complete a simple task.

Android analogy
How powerful an open source platform combined with an open market for third party developers can be is proven by the Android Market. Within a year more than 20,000 applications - the majority offered for free - were developed, and consequently Android became in no-time a major threat for Apple´s iPhone dominance. See earlier post.

Microsoft and Apple team up against Google

Meanwhile the dinosaurs  from the 20th century  - former arch-enemies Microsoft and Apple - are more and more beginning to feel the heat from the Open Source threat to their closed-source fundamentals. They even begin warming up to each other when it becomes clear to both companies that Google is becoming their biggest competitor. Microsoft and Apple are reportedly close to adding Bing search to the iPhone. BusinessWeek on Jan. 19 reported the companies were in extended talks about replacing Google as the iPhone's default search service.