Pike Place Market in Seattle, Photo by David Poteet
Custom development of native mobile applications is very expensive. We have found that on average it takes 2.5 times longer to develop functionality for a native app than it would take to develop the same functionality for a web-based application.
Native software is much more prone to crashes, so you also have to spend considerably more time testing your apps before release.
Beyond the cost of initial development, you have to make regular updates to your source code whenever phone vendors like Apple or Google update their operating systems. In our experience, each major upgrade to the Apple iOS (typically 3-4 times a year) has required 2-3 weeks of development to fix problems that are introduced as Apple changes its code libraries.
Why do native development at all then? Why not just create a mobile website? Native apps open up a world of possibilities for rich, responsive interaction. For example, without native apps we couldn't seamlessly integrate maps within the app. With native apps, you can store all your content and maps on the device so that it works without a cell connection.
The cost to license the Nomad platform is a small fraction of the cost you would pay to develop and maintain similar functionality in a "from scratch" custom app. When you consider that Nomad allows extensive customization within the framework, it's hard to make a case for investing in your own software. Most travel marketers and publishers don't want to become software developers. That's why we built Nomad.
With Nomad, you get:
