Hi, new here and trying to make sure Blynk is a good fit for what I need to achieve before committing too much time on the programming side.
I’m developing a controller that will be an addon to an existing already deployed control system - potentially this would be useful to 1000s of existing users, and would make a good commercial product. I don’t however have £99 squillion behind me in VC money! Looking at the business plans on offer, it seems that the entry level (needed to get such essentials as the easy wifi provisioning etc, and branding) is effectively a $2000 commitment - the monthly is not an option (for me) as it allows only one app update. Even the simplest app surely needs more than that in the first year / first few releases!
I was disappointed to not find a ‘field trials’ level - maybe for $20-50 a month, where the full range of facilities were available, but at a cost that reflected that revenues were small or non existent - I guess in summary it seems a huge leap from one off hobby tinkering to commercial use.
One a related point, looking in the Android Play store, there seems to be only 1 or 2 ‘real’ Blynk apps published, but the site claims 100,000s of developers? Are they just all hobby, and there is no commercial use to date?
Hello.
Actually 200$.
200$ is very close to 20-50$. App publishing requires manual work, so 200$ is actually super cheap.
We just launched publishing 2 months ago. Many customers are in pipeline as publishing is the final step. You have to do a lot of work before publishing.
Developers != business.
I’m sorry - I’m missing something. The month by month commitment requires payment every time you update the app no? (an additional $200 payment?). So to make multiple updates of the app without paying $200 each time, you have to commit to the year - $2000? Did I misunderstand that?
Do you have any docs on the publishing process. I am not clear on what you have to do between a working app and publishing that would take two months. It would be good to understand this in advance.
(Finally $20-50 and $200 are not close, especially if the $200 actually is $2000 to enable app updates. It’s your business model of course and your choice, but I would be doing more to support micro startups and ideas that one day might become the 10000+ unit customers. When I’m making money I’m VERY happy to share the profits- but all the while I am not, every dollar counts and these costs could kill some good ideas and projects!)
You subscribe to plan, let’s say 2k for a year. We publish the app for you. Now you can use it. After the app is published you still may do changes to it (add widgets, change widgets layout, add devices, etc). All this is not actually “app update”. All your clients will get updated layout when you click “update”. App update is scenario - when you need to upload the new app to google play. You may need this when we will add some new feature you really want to add your published app.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLKuIHaraKs - all links are attached below the video.
Well, many people think that having the working prototype is all they need. But truth is - it is a bit more complicated.
You can use the current Blynk app for that. It is almost free. Yes, it is not branded, however, if your product is real thing -
that’s wouldn’t be a problem. Some people actually even run the business on top of the Blynk without paying us. And we are ok with that 
.
That makes things clearer I think - my minimum commitment is just $200, and ‘minor’ changes within the app are actually free as they are handled internally at a Blynk level and not at Google Play level. Still lots to be said about promoting small scale (initially) projects that may become the next Nest or whatever - look at what Amazon are doing currently with Alexa to promote coders writing skills for that. Thanks for all the info - will continue reading and learning.
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Yes. I agree. We would love to decrease the price and make the entrance as low as possible.
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Maybe something based on limited number of devices deployed, or limited timescale (ie max six months or similar). Particle do something a little similar - although not quite in the same market!