In a bid to ease some of the growing pains media companies face as they adapt to a rapidly changing digital world, earlier this month Polar Mobile launch
MediaEverywhere, a development platform for mobile sites (in the future it will also include mobile apps). Among the Canadian publishers signed up:
Toronto Star, Canadian Living, Hockey News and
Elle Canada.
The plaform "enables media companies to build better custom mobile sites and apps faster and easier than traditional custom development," wrote Polar CEO Kunal Gupta in
a blog post introducing MediaEverywhere. Essentially, it's a tool that aims to streamline the process of making publications mobile friendly, which reduce costs for publishers in the process.
"Media companies are going through a second revolution," Rob Begg, VP of marketing for MediaEverywhere, told us over the phone. The first was the move from print to digital, and this second one is the shift specifically to mobile. Media companies of all types report that mobile is by far their fastest growing type of traffic, but developing sites and apps in the mobile market is tough, says Begg, due to the proliferation of platforms.
MediaEverywhere saves companies from having to put money into iOS, Android and other platforms separately—or worse, only having the money to develop in one at a time. Begg describes the approach as "mobile-centric rather than device-specific."
The total investment in Polar Mobile to date is $9 million; $6 million of that went towards building this platform. Currently they have 40 staff and are hiring enthusiastically, says Begg.
Writer: Hamutal Dotan
Source: Rob Begg, VP of Marketing, MediaEverywhere