In a recent report by the leading mobile application testing company, Kobiton, startling statistics emerged, stating that annual financial losses exceeding $100,000 are experienced by 75% of firms. This is a direct result of slow mobile app update rollouts. Furthermore, as high as 13% of participants revealed annual losses between $1 million to $10 million due to the same issue. The results shine a spotlight on the far-reaching consequences that lagging application updates can have on a company's revenue stream.
A further 75% of respondents indicated that mobile applications constituted at least a quarter of their organizational revenue, underlining that slow updates not only affect profitability, but also risk overall business viability.
When surveyed about the frequency of mobile app update releases, the responses were diverse. Weekly updates were prevalent amongst 38% of the respondents, followed by 27% who roll out updates monthly. Daily releases were observed by 20% of firms, and 14% preferred a quarterly release schedule. A small fraction, around 1%, reported that they update their mobile apps less frequently than once per quarter.
When discussing the time required to perform automated tests, 28% respondents conveyed it takes 1-3 hours; 32% said it took slightly longer, 3-6 hours. Another 21% said the process stretched to 6-9 hours, while 8% indicated more than 10 hours. A small percentage, 11%, boasted that their automated tests could be completed in less than an hour.
Companies that have transitioned from manual to automated testing processes have witnessed a 25% to 50% decrease in time to market, according to 37% of survey respondents. An impressive reduction of over 50% was reported by 18% of participants.
As per the survey results, 48% of respondents automated between 10 to 24% of their tests at the time, and 22% automated between 25 to 49%. Approximately half of the respondents aspire to automate over 50% of their testing procedures. Companies are employing a variety of strategies like training employees for automation skills, hiring more automation engineers, using low-code/no-code automation tools, and building automation scripts with iOS and Android Native frameworks to increase their test automation coverage.
When it comes to leveraging generative AI within their testing strategy, 47% of respondents utilize it for creating test scripts, 60% rely on it for updating scripts or code, and 55% deploy it to analyze test results. Only a miniscule 8% reported not using generative AI for their testing at all.
Future anticipations in enhancing AI capabilities include predicting potential defects (51%), utilizing generative AI for test case creation and data (45%), applying natural language processing to improve test case documentation (44%), image recognition for UI testing (36%), and self-healing test strategies (36%).
In a statement, Frank Moyer, CTO of Kobiton, said, “Witnessing the transformative power of AI tools in mobile app development and testing has been an incredible journey. Productivity augmentation, cost reduction, and enabling professionals to focus on strategic tasks, AI is revolutionizing the landscape of the industry. I am looking forward to a significant and speedy adoption of AI-driven methodologies as these tools continue to evolve.”
While the slow mobile app releases present an undeniable challenge, it becomes imperative for companies to speed up the development process and take lessons from enterprises using platforms, like the AppMaster, designed to build scalable and efficient applications in less time.
