Nowadays almost every business industry has a mobile app for it, whether its fitness, food fashion, games, travel etc. You name it and you have it. The list is endless. The mobile app development industry is booming in leaps and bounds. There is great demand of app development in business world as everyone wants access to plethora of information on the go, plus mobile phones have proven to be a great marketing tool because of their increased usage. That is the reason why these apps have become a staple for a business to survive today. Businesses around the world are facing a great amount of pressure along with a cut throat competition to strive and thrive it to the next level. Hence it has become an imperative part of their decision making process to determine as to whether go for building an in-house app or to outsource the development of app in question.

Like every coin have two sides, this one also comes with its own perks and perils which can make or mar a business strategy to a great extent. Let us closely examine some of the pros and cons of both in-house as well as outsourcing of app development.

Building in-house apps:

First of all, one requires quite a lot of resources, investment and a set of skilled professionals to make in-house apps work. It is usually ideal for big companies, who can afford to spend their resources, time and money in building an in-house team to get the job done. However in some cases, in the area of startup businesses, you just need three kind of main members in your team:

• Programmers/Coders- to crack build the code to solve a business problem
• Designers- to outline the design of the app
• Analyst- They should be able to manage and understand the business

One can also go for allocation of such tasks to a group of talented and skilled employees, if the company has a large employee base. This way, the company will save a lot of resources, which will otherwise get spent on hiring a third-party mobile app development partner.

Pros:

• The in-house team tends to understand the business more, than anyone else. It knows the ins and outs of the business in a better way. The team is usually familiar with the goals and philosophy of the business as well as market competition in conjunction with the audience the business is targeting at.
• The process of building in-house app is generally devoid of any communication gap as both, the Product owner and the app development team is working under the same roof. It also ensures inputs from the management personnel like business development managers and project managers as they share their experiences and expertise that can lead to a better app development.
• Because the app development team is an in-house one, the commissioning of the responsibilities to the team members as per their talent, becomes much easier task for the Project manager as he ensure the best utilization of resources in accordance with the business goals.
• Again, as the app is developing under the same premises as the Product owner, he makes it a point to ascertain that everything is going according to a set business strategy without making any compromise on the final product outcome. One can also set a fixed budget as well as bring on some changes as per market demand.
• It is also easier to coordinate with an in-house team as compared a outsourced development team

Cons:

• As stated earlier, hiring an in-house team to build a mobile app can sometimes become cumbersome, time consuming and expensive affair. One needs to have a lot of professional expertise like: designers, developers, analysts, quality assurance engineers, project managers, team leads etc.
• Obtaining software licenses or certificates for web and mobile app development can make it a bit complicated as well as time consuming.
• Staffing the right kind of people with the right amount of skill and expertise is s long term process.

Outsourcing the Mobile App Development Process:

This method of app development is suitable for small scale companies or for those who doesn’t want to invest much money and save more time.

Pros:

• One gets a variety of options to choose from in terms of mobile app partner. You can select companies on the basis of skill sets, locations, experiences, and costs. One can coordinate with them as per their business requirement
• This method is less expensive as compared to the in-house app development as you don’t need to acquire any sort of license, certificate or infrastructure. The app development company is always there to cope up with the challenges incurred during the process.
• A business can save a lot of time and energy by assigning the task of creating an app to a third-party company. This time and energy can be better utilized in chalking out a market strategy for the app.
• The risk factor in this method is much lower than the in-house development. This is because of the business hiring the top most app developers who are well acquainted with the current market scenario

Cons:

• Communication barriers may sometimes occur between client and app development that located in a different location or operates in a different time zone. This problem is very much reduced nowadays due to top app development companies adjusting their schedule as per the client’s convenience, so that they can stay in touch with their clients during the whole development process of the app
• There is great risk of quality in case of outsourced app development, because the whole app development is not undertaken under your supervision. But like in the above case, this problem also comes with a solution. A major chunk of mobile app development companies today uses the Agile Methodology, wherein the company divides the entire project into different modules that are freely coded, tested, and then, sent to the client. It ensures quality outcome besides saving lots of time and money.

The decision of whether to build an in-house team or outsource a third-party app development company wholly depends on requirements of the business. Factors like time to market, the budget, and the size of the company, must be kept under consideration while determining the same.