AT&T realizes that mobile applications are a huge opportunity. After all, they do have the largest and most popular platform, the iPhone app store, solely on their network. But now they're looking to improve their mobile app and widget presence. Oh, and they're doing it in a big way: they've just acquired mobile app developer Plusmo.
Plusmo, for those who are not familiar, is a mobile widget developer and platform. It allows developers to create apps in a common web development standard and then place them on multiple mobile platforms (BlackBerry, Symbian, iPhone OS, etc.) without the need to develop them all individually for each platform. Plusmo has also created several popular mobile sports widgets.
So why did AT&T buy Plusmo? Simple: they want to make mobile app development easier on its line of phones. They're looking to drop the cost of app development while spreading new apps across multiple platforms. This makes all of its phones that much more enticing. The widgets are nice, but they're a secondary concern to AT&T.