Parse Facebook deal sees developer boost in face of naysayers

By Chris Burns/April 28, 2013 1:50 pm EST

This week the folks at Facebook and Parse have announced that they're joining teams, effectively, as the social networking giant acquires the company known for backend infrastructure for mobile apps. As a selection of notes from developers has appeared in comments and forums surrounding the acquisition suggesting they'd leave Parse in fear of Facebook, Parse CEO suggests the opposite has been happening. Noting the service's growth rate has increased by more than 9.4 times its normal rate, Parse CEO Ilya Suhkar has made a case for Facebook's influence as wholly positive.

Parse developer user base sits at around 60,000 at the moment, and heads at both Facebook and Parse has been adamant thus far about making sure they know the full extent of Facebook's influence in the near future. A statement has been released making it relatively clear that Facebook has no intent on changing the way that Parse-developed app data is used. Parse competitors are using this situation as an opportunity to drain the company of disloyal developers.

One example of a competing service looking to capitalize on the Facebook acquisition of Parse is StackMob. This company has created a set of import tools made to make the move between Parse and themselves as simple as possible, and Parse developers have suggested they've been contacted by other services since the announcement as well.

"Q: Will my Parse app be affected in any way? No.

Q: Will Parse apps have to use Facebook functionality? No.

Q: Will Parse honor my contract? Yes, of course." – Ilya Sukhar, Parse CEO

In the acquisition of Parse, Facebook has claimed it will bring several next-generation tools to the fold, making Parse's draw more powerful under the rule of the social network. Advertisement-selling features will be added for developers to make use of, and new Facebook login tools will be made much easier to work with, of course. Parse developers will also be able to work with Facebook's Open Graph for mobile as well.

[via TechCrunch]