Demand for mobile development grew 180% in 2009, fueled by the successes of the Apple and Android operating systems, according to Elance, an online talent marketplace for freelance computer programmers and other digital talent.
Web development is the leading subcategory in the space, with PHP being the most popular skill in the category, but jobs in mobile development are exploding. “Within 24 hours of the Apple iPad announcement, 20 iPad application development jobs were immediately posted on Elance. At the time of this release, there are 70 open iPad jobs on the site. This trend is likely to follow the fast growth of iPhone projects which saw more than 8,800 iPhone jobs completed on Elance in 2009. In addition, Android is rising fast in the ranking of skills in demand – up 400% in the past six months with more than 170 projects posted in the last month alone,” Elance noted.
As smartphones and cloud computing trends become more popular, Elance said it expected demand for writing to those skill sets to increase as well. Its top subcategories under the IT category include Web, mobile, open source and cloud computing. Creative and marketing categories also are seeing increased activity.
“As we move forward in 2010, more people will make the online workplace their new office and will log in to get to work,” said Ellen Pack, VP of marketing at Elance. “Three trends have come together to make this possible. Companies continue to look for greater flexibility and efficiency, more skilled professionals are choosing to work independently, and managing online work has become easier than ever due to sophisticated Web applications, mobile devices and cloud computing platforms. This year, in particular, we will begin to see an interesting shift from small businesses to larger enterprises accelerating their use of online talent.”
No doubt, people in the wireless industry already are aware of this firsthand. LSN Mobile CEO Lee Durham commented that anyone with knowledge of how to write for the Android operating system likely will have an easy time finding employment. LSN Mobile partners with media outlets and advertisers on local mobile search.