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Three months ahead of its official launch, the test version of iPhone's Software Development Kit is luring developers by the thousands -- tens of thousands, actually.
More than 100,000 developers downloaded the beta version of the iPhone 2.0 software, which bears the enterprise-supporting SDK, in the first four days it was available, Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) said Wednesday.
Reaction to the launch has been "incredible," said Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of worldwide product marketing 
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More than 1 million people have watched the launch video on Apple.com, "further demonstrating the incredible interest developers have in creating applications for the iPhone," he added.
Apple also previewed its new App Store, a tool for developers to deliver their applications to iPhone and iPod touch users. Developers set the price for their applications -- including free -- and keep 70 percent of all sales revenues, Apple said.
Actively Engaging Developers
AOL, Electronic Arts (Nasdaq: ERTS), Epocrates, Salesforce.com (NYSE: CRM) and Sega are among developers showing interest in the SDK, Apple said.
The number of downloads isn't an issue, IDC analyst Shiv Bakhshi told MacNewsWorld. "There's no reason to contest the numbers; there's no reason to believe otherwise. The interesting thing is the SDK itself."
The SDK already has drawn considerable attention for its support for Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) Exchange ActiveSync, enabling the iPhone to connect to Microsoft Exchange Servers 2003 and 2007. Enterprise customers will have secure, over-the-air push e-mail , contacts and calendars, in addition to remote erasure capabilities for a lost or stolen iPhone.
The technology also provides enterprise customers with Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) IPsec (Internet protocol security) VPN (virtual private network) for encrypted access to private corporate networks.
"I think Apple has done a good job outlining not only the SDK and what it can do, but also the fact that they have provided tools to make it easier for folks in the developer community," Bakhshi said.
There's also a simulator available for download on Apple computers. "That's a nice piece," Bakhshi commented. "It works only on an Apple computer, which may be a limiting factor, but if you're working with Apple applications, you want to be familiar with Apple systems. The fact that they're doing it on Apple systems is fine."
The formal launch of the tested iPhone 2.0 is scheduled for late June -- a year after the iPhone's market-shaking debut.
Answering Critics
The iPhone had attracted criticism for not being enterprise-friendly enough. However, the SDK will answer those critics, Yankee Group analyst Mike Goodman said.
"People want to be able to access their e-mail, not just their personal accounts -- they want to access their corporate accounts," Goodman told MacNewsWorld. "They want to use their iPhone as their principal phone."
Before, Apple's reticence about competing in the enterprise market might have been a drag on the iPhone, Goodman said.
"It prevents Apple from competing in the enterprise, corporate mobile space if they can't coordinate with Microsoft servers," he noted. "They needed to simplify the process."
Developers are likely to flock to the iPhone once this new technology hits the market, Bakhshi said. "I think the iPhone is such an iconic device, [so] it's going to invite a lot of developers. If you make the workability of an application easier, the chance of succeeding in the multimedia space is higher."
Apple, by no means, will be alone is innovating along these lines, Bakhshi noted.
"Apple is also a much smaller group than, say, working for Nokia's (NYSE: NOK) developer community or something, but there's space for everybody."
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