The Qt Company Introduces Major Expansion to Its Development Framework to Support Global Demand for Connected Devices

HELSINKI, FINLAND and SANTA CLARA, CA--(Marketwired - Sep 27, 2016) - The Qt Company, which provides a cross-platform framework for companies to write their applications only once, yet run them anywhere and on any device, introduced today the Qt Lite Project, a major expansion of its framework that makes software and device development faster, easier and more lightweight than ever before. Built into Qt's existing framework, Qt Lite contains a wide range of enhancements that enable developers to streamline the creation and delivery of software and devices for all relevant platforms and any thing -- regardless of its size. Qt's technology is currently in use by millions of developers across the world and eight of the top 10 Fortune 500 companies.

With 6.4 billion connected things in use in 2016, the connected device market is expected to grow from $157.05 billion in 2016 to $661.74 billion by 2021 (at a Compound Annual Growth Rate of 33.3 percent from 2016 to 2021), according to research from Gartner and MarketsandMarkets. Considering this huge market opportunity for organizations and independent developers building connected devices for the Internet of Things (IoT), Qt sought to ensure that all devices can communicate over supported protocols and that software can easily be extended to the next-generation device -- a concept known as "future proofing" that is especially critical in burgeoning markets like the IoT. With Qt Lite, developers are able to capitalize on this market opportunity by quickly and easily building the applications and devices for today's and tomorrow's connected device/IoT industry.

"The number of connected devices in use nowadays is growing at an exponential rate, but there is a rather finite pool of developers able to build applications and software for these technologies," said Andy Mulholland, vice president and principal analyst, Constellation Research. "As a result, in order to keep up with consumer demand and seize the opportunity created by connected devices and the Internet of Things, developers need a platform that is able to strike a perfect balance between offering a robust set of development tools while providing a nimble and lightweight delivery model." 

As with the overarching Qt framework of software and device development tools, Qt Lite has been specifically designed to enable the streamlined development of software and devices for a wide range of industries, including the healthcare, automotive, avionics, and home appliance and entertainment sectors. With Qt Lite, organizations and developers can be at the forefront of technology innovation in these and other industries by building cutting-edge software and devices including in-dashboard screens for connected cars; smart medical devices; and feature-rich user interfaces (UIs) for WiFi-enabled home entertainment systems.

"For the past 20 years Qt has been used on a massively wide range of operating systems and embedded devices, but we've seen a growing need for Qt to become a more targeted framework that will facilitate the whole development cycle and lifetime of products for embedded devices," said Lars Knoll, CTO, The Qt Company. "By introducing Qt Lite, we're providing our customers and partners with a lightweight and streamlined version of the Qt framework they've come to know and trust. As a result, they're able to reap the benefits of a shorter and less intensive development cycle, including reduced R&D costs, faster time-to-market for new products, and the ability to dedicate valuable resources towards other strategic business initiatives." 

Qt Lite contains a comprehensive set of tools that expands Qt's framework and makes it faster, higher performing, more lightweight, and easier to work with than ever before. Key features of Qt Lite include:

• New Configuration System: The new configuration system in Qt allows developers to define the content they need from each module in much more detail for their projects and easily allows for feature-based tailoring of the Qt modules. This includes full enablement for Qt Core, Qt Network, Qt GUI, Qt QML and Qt Quick.
• New Graphical Configuration Tool: Qt has also developed a new graphical tool for configuring, selecting and setting various options when building with Qt. By making all the options available easily accessible, integrating the documentation and providing reasonable starting default configurations for various use cases, developers gain a simple and efficient way to enhance their existing projects.
• Flexible Developer Workflow: Qt Lite allows developers to start with a minimal deployable configuration and simply add in any additional feature they may require while developing their projects. By significantly reducing the time spent on optimization at the end of the project, products can have a much faster time-to-market.
• No OpenGL Requirement: Qt sees the need for cheaper, more efficient or specially certified hardware that does not support OpenGL. To meet this need, Qt Lite introduces a fully integrated, supported and efficient 2D Software Renderer for Qt Quick. This allows developers to use all the power of the CSS and JavaScript-like language, QML, to create beautiful user interfaces on embedded devices without OpenGL hardware available.
• Expanded Hardware Support: A major part of Qt's focus is expanding the selection of available hardware that developers can easily and efficiently use to deploy Qt-based applications. Several devices and project types can benefit from Qt's current efforts, such as devices with RAM and Flash in the 32MB or even 16MB area, with the intention to go much lower in the future. Furthermore, there is no longer a need for OpenGL hardware to use Qt Quick, which significantly extends the number of devices on which Qt can be used.
  
  

You can learn more about The Qt Company, the Qt Lite Project, and the upcoming Qt 5.8 release at this year's Qt World Summit, the largest annual event dedicated to Qt developers, business leaders and product managers. The event will take place at Pier 27 in San Francisco from October 18-20 and will feature thought-provoking keynotes and demos, insightful breakouts, and industry highlights. For more information on the Qt World Summit 2016, please visit: http://www.qtworldsummit.com/

About The Qt Company
The Qt Company develops and delivers the Qt development framework under commercial and open source licenses. We enable the reuse of software code across all operating systems, platforms and screen types, from desktops and embedded systems to wearables and mobile devices. Qt is used by approximately one million developers worldwide and is the leading independent technology behind millions of devices and applications. Qt is the platform of choice for in-vehicle systems, industrial automation devices, and other business critical application manufacturers, and is used by leading global players in more than 70 industries. The Qt Company is owned by the Qt Group, which operates in China, Finland, Germany, Japan, Korea, Norway, Russia and USA with more than 200 employees worldwide. The Qt Group is headquartered in Espoo, Finland and is listed on Nasdaq Helsinki Stock Exchange. The company's net sales in year 2015 was 27 MEUR. To learn more visit http://qt.io