critical advantage - the loyalty of mobile app developers.
Many developers have continued to make applications first, and sometimes only, for iPhones. They find it easier to create software for Apple devices than for ones running Android, or it may be more lucrative. Their allegiance to Apple has helped make its devices the powerhouse they are for the company.
"Android may have a lead in how many handsets it ships, but it doesn't have a lead in how much money app developers are making from it," said Hadi Partovi, an investor in technology startups like Dropbox and a former manager at Microsoft.
In WWDC starting June 11, Apple will seek to strengthen its ties to mobile developers with a series of product announcements on the opening day of its developer conference in San Francisco, an annual ritual where the company tries to stimulate the creative juices of this important constituency. The company is expected to introduce a new version of the iOSoperating system that powers iPhones and iPads, according to people familiar with Apple's plans who were not authorized to speak about them publicly.
One feature of that software is expected to be an eye-catching new 3D map service operated by Apple that will pose a challenge to a Google map service used within many iPhone applications, these people said.
"It's a lot more beautiful," said one of these people, who has seen a demonstration of Apple's maps service.
At the same time, Apple is expected to update its Mac family of computers with new hardware, these people said.
Rival technologies suffering from a scarcity of apps, including Research in Motion's BlackBerryand Microsoft's Windows Phone, are finding it difficult to persuade developers to invest in them.
Apple's continued influence among mobile app developers flies in the face of predictions that the company would steadily lose clout as Android phones flooded the market, presenting developers with a much bigger target audience. And it could help Apple avoid the fate the Macintosh suffered in the 1990s when competing with PCs running Microsoft's Windows operating system.
Although many considered the Mac to be superior, Microsoft outsold Apple's computers in part by distributing its product broadly on hardware made by many companies, which helped Windows to snowball.
Software developers flocked to the larger Windows PC market, which in turn attracted more customers, which attracted still more software developers to Windows. For the better part of two decades, Microsoft held the allegiance of software developers, relegating the Mac to the periphery of the computer business.
In the mobile market, there's no doubt Apple's share has been overshadowed by Google, which makes Android freely available to any hardware maker who wants to build a phone with it.
There have been predictions that the huge volume of Android smartphones being sold would persuade developers to abandon or at least weaken their iPhone efforts by, for example, developing apps first for phones running Android.
The variations in hardware and software are not insurmountable obstacles, developers say, but performing the testing to ensure that apps run properly on most Android phones adds time and cost.
"Apple is almost the default first platform you develop for and then you develop for Android," said Rob Cihra, an analyst at Evercore Partners.
Furthermore, Apple has been far more effective in getting iPhone users to update their phones with the latest version of iOS than Google and its partners have with Android. This makes it easier for iPhone developers to write their apps because there is less variation in the underlying software on the devices.
One other advantage Apple has among developers is the iPad, which has so far maintained its dominance in the tablet category, despite challenges by an assortment of Android tablets. Because the iPhone and iPad use iOS, it is relatively easy for developers to adapt their software to run on Apple's tablet, significantly expanding the audience of potential customers beyond the iPhone.
It is difficult to say whether Apple's position with developers will remain strong if Android continues to gobble market share. But various surveys have tried to gauge which smartphones developers plan to write apps for in the near future, and the iPhone often scores very high.
Still, Google is closing the gap between the sheer number of apps for Android, which stands at about 500,000. Earlier this year, Apple said there were 600,000 apps in its App Store.
One occasional source of discontent among Apple's developers is the greater control that the company exerts over its App Store, for which it takes a more hands-on approach to approving software for distribution than Google does.
