fbstart

Facebook has crowned the winner of its first-ever Fb Start competition, a contest that sought to identify the best apps in the world that are part of its program aimed at helping mobile developers. The grand prize winning team, which will receive $50,000 in cash and $25,000 in Facebook Ad Credit, is Beijing, China-based Hightalk Software, makers of MomentCam. The app, which allows users to easily create and share customized caricatures of people, has been downloaded more than 200 million times. Fb Start also named a set of regional winners, each of which will get $5,000 in cash and $5,000 in…

Facebook announced that its global developer program FbStart is growing rapidly, with the number of participating startups rising by 61 percent in the past five months. The company also revealed that today it’s rolling out a new sharing feature for developers. Oh, and one more thing: Facebook announced the dates for next year’s F8 developer conference: April 12-13 at the Fort Mason Center in San Francisco, California. Deborah Liu, the vice president of platform at the social networking company, spoke at a press conference today about how Facebook is reaching out to developers worldwide through FbStart. Seventy percent of Facebook’s developers come from outside the U.S.…

In 2014, Facebook launched an initiative aimed at giving assistance to local developers to help them produce applications that would have a beneficial impact on their community and region. Since that time, the company has provided $250 million in benefits. But what makes FbStart so effective? To answer that question, look to one of its supported startups. At last year’s F8 developer conference, Facebook hailed MomentCam as a model example of FbStart. Deb Liu, Facebook’s vice president of platform, said in a statement: “We reviewed hundreds of applicants to find the ones with significant growth and retention, the best user experience…