News

Startup moBack Offers Self-Deployable Mobile Backend Platform

• By David Ramel
• May 8, 2015

Startup moBack Inc. has entered the increasingly crowded Mobile Backend-as-a-Service (MBaaS) arena with a new platform emphasizing ease of use and control of customization features.

MBaaS platforms typically let developers hook mobile apps into backend cloud storage and provide APIs and SDKs for functionality such as user management, authorization, querying, push notifications and social integration.

"IT teams today are challenged by the constant need to upgrade their application infrastructure in order to roll out new services at the speed of mobile," said CEO Dev Gandhi in a statement announcing the new product yesterday. "Having worked with more than 150 customers, we realized that ease of use and control are important features of a private MBaaS platform. moBack's self-service model allows IT to customize their instance with just a few clicks. We are very excited about the platform, which is in every sense an answer to the vast community of developers and enterprises constrained by complex platform restrictions while using basic backend APIs."

While the announcement didn't mention the names of those constraining platforms, the company's Web site states: "Parse limits you, we don't."

moBack Enterprise can run on the Amazon Web Services Inc. (AWS) cloud or on an on-premises private cloud behind a corporate firewall.

Core features include a data manager that developers can use with REST APIs and SDKs for iOS and Android to create, modify and store data tables with minimal coding, the company said.

That coding can be done with the usual languages: Java, C++, JavaScript, C#, Objective-C and PHP.

moBack Enterprise also provides management of user and group information, access control to ensure data integrity via roles, permissions and access credentials, a simple file manager, an analytics dashboard and push notifications.

Along with announcing its MBaaS platform, the company announced the results of its survey that concluded most companies find MBaaS platforms to be very important.

With 65 percent of some 200 decision-makers polled now using cloud-based backend platforms, the most reported challenges include acquiring needed technical skills, speed of delivery and flexibility for rapid development.

Other survey findings include:

• 75 percent of the respondents indicated ease of use as being very important and essential in an MBaaS platform.
• Two-thirds require or highly value the ability of an MBaaS platform to customize, include their organization's business specific functions and reduce cost.
• Cost and security were cited as the deciding characteristic of 70 percent of respondents.

To address the cost issue, a free 45-day trial on AWS is available and the company is providing a moBack Lite edition for free for one year for customers who sign up this year. The company didn't provide information on how the Lite version differs from the non-Lite version.

The Sunnyvale, Calif., startup said yesterday's announcement marked "the launch of a multi-phase rollout of the cloud-based platform." No details were provided about future phases.