Intelligent Mobile Application Development

Mobile apps that think, learn, and see — powered by on-device AI.

NCompas builds AI-powered iOS, Android, and cross-platform applications — from streaming in-app copilots and real-time computer vision to offline ML inference and AR experiences — delivered in production in 3–8 weeks.

6.9Bsmartphone users globally by 2025 — making mobile the primary digital touchpoint for over 85% of the world's population, and the channel where AI-powered experiences generate the highest engagement and retention.
48%higher user retention for AI-personalised mobile apps vs. static equivalents — because apps that learn from behaviour, anticipate needs, and surface relevant content at the right moment keep users coming back (Liftoff, 2024).
94%accuracy achievable by on-device ML models running on-device for real-time tasks — from computer vision and OCR to NLP and anomaly detection — with zero round-trip latency to a cloud server.
3–8 wksNCompas delivery window for a production-ready AI-enhanced mobile app — React Native + native AI SDKs + App Store submission — for organisations that need results, not roadmaps.

Why NCompas

Mobile apps that users keep — not delete after the first week.

Retention is the only metric that matters in mobile. Everything we build is designed to give users a reason to open the app tomorrow.

AI-First Mobile Architecture

We design for AI from the first architecture decision — on-device model selection, data pipeline for personalisation, streaming API integration, and offline AI capability baked in. AI features in mobile have unique constraints (battery, memory, latency) that require purpose-built architecture, not retrofitted widgets.

React Native, Flutter & Native — All Three

We don't have a single-framework religion. React Native, Flutter, Swift, and Kotlin are all production-capability for our engineers. We choose the right tool for your context — not the tool our team prefers, not the tool we've already paid for licences for.

On-Device ML Specialists

Not every AI feature should call a cloud API. We know when to run on-device (latency-critical, privacy-sensitive, offline-needed) and when to call the cloud (complex reasoning, large models). And when we run on-device, we know how to quantise, prune, and optimise models to meet mobile memory and battery constraints.

Offline-First by Default

Real mobile users go underground, lose signal, and use their phone on aircraft. Apps that break without connectivity aren't production-grade. We build offline-first — local-first data with sync, on-device AI inference, queued mutations, and graceful degradation — as the default, not a later requirement.

App Store & Play Store Expertise

App Store Review Guidelines and Google Play policies are a maze of evolving rules — especially for apps using AI, health data, financial data, or user-generated content. We've shipped dozens of apps through both stores, including edge-case categories, and we know how to write review notes, handle rejections, and get approved first time.

Security & Compliance Built In

Mobile apps handle some of the most sensitive data a user has — health, finance, location. OWASP Mobile Top 10, biometric auth, secure enclave storage, certificate pinning, jailbreak/root detection, and GDPR-compliant data handling aren't bolt-ons we add at the end. They're in the architecture from sprint zero.

Six capability domains

AI-powered mobile — from copilots to computer vision to AR.

Six interconnected mobile engineering capabilities, each purpose-built for the constraints and opportunities of the device in your users' pockets.

AI-Powered Mobile Features

Intelligent mobile features that make your app genuinely useful — personalised content feeds, predictive search, conversational in-app assistants, real-time recommendations, anomaly alerts, and intelligent notifications that fire at the right moment based on behaviour, not a cron job.

In-app AI chat & voice assistantsPersonalised content rankingPredictive search & autocompleteSmart push notification timingAnomaly detection & alertsOn-device sentiment analysis
48% higher retention for AI-personalised apps vs. static equivalents — across iOS and Android

On-Device ML & Edge AI

AI that runs entirely on the device — no round-trip to a cloud API, no latency, no privacy compromise. Core ML (iOS), TensorFlow Lite, PyTorch Mobile, and ONNX Runtime enable real-time inference for camera, audio, sensor, and text inputs. We train, quantise, and optimise models for mobile hardware.

Core ML (iOS) integrationTensorFlow Lite & PyTorch MobileONNX Runtime on-device inferenceModel quantisation & pruningReal-time camera ML inferenceFederated learning for privacy
On-device inference achieves 94% model accuracy at 30fps — with zero network dependency for real-time tasks

Computer Vision & AR Experiences

Mobile cameras are the most powerful sensor your users carry. We build apps that use them — object detection, OCR, barcode/QR scanning, face recognition, medical imaging, AR product try-on, spatial measurement, and real-time video analysis. ARKit (iOS) and ARCore (Android) for augmented reality overlays that add real utility, not novelty.

Real-time object detection & OCRARKit (iOS) & ARCore (Android)AR product visualisation & try-onFace detection & liveness checkMedical image capture & annotationBarcode / QR / document scanning
AR product try-on reduces e-commerce returns by 25% and increases conversion by 40% on mobile

Native iOS & Android Engineering

When maximum performance, deep OS integration, or platform-specific capability demands native development, we build for it. SwiftUI and Swift Concurrency for iOS; Kotlin and Jetpack Compose for Android — with full access to HealthKit, SiriKit, App Clips, Widgets, Live Activities, and Android-specific capabilities.

SwiftUI + Swift Concurrency (iOS)Kotlin + Jetpack Compose (Android)HealthKit / Google Fit integrationSiriKit / Google Assistant actionsiOS Live Activities & Dynamic IslandAndroid App Widgets
Native development delivers 100% platform API coverage — essential for HealthKit, AR, and payment integrations

Mobile Performance, Security & DevOps

Mobile apps live and die by start time, frame rate, and battery impact. We profile, optimise, and ship clean — then automate the delivery pipeline with Fastlane, GitHub Actions, and EAS Build. Security-first: certificate pinning, biometric authentication, secure enclave storage, and OWASP Mobile Top 10 compliance baked in.

Performance profiling & optimisationFastlane CI/CD & EAS BuildBiometric auth & secure enclaveCertificate pinning & HTTPS enforcementOWASP Mobile Top 10 complianceApp Store & Play Store submission
Sub-2-second cold start and 60fps achieved in all shipped apps — zero critical OWASP vulnerabilities at launch

Platform selection

React Native, Flutter, or Native — the honest guide to choosing.

No framework religion. We pick the right tool for your context — and we'll tell you if we think you're choosing the wrong one.

React Native

Best when: Your team knows JavaScript/TypeScript, you need both iOS and Android, and you want access to the npm ecosystem. Best for apps with complex state management and teams already using React.

  • Largest community & ecosystem
  • TypeScript / JavaScript
  • Expo managed workflow
  • Fast refresh
  • OTA updates (CodePush)

Flutter

Best when: You need pixel-perfect custom UI, consistent look across iOS and Android, or are targeting web and desktop alongside mobile. Best for design-heavy apps with complex custom animations.

  • Custom UI pixel-perfect
  • Excellent performance
  • Web & desktop too
  • Strong animation engine
  • Material 3 + Cupertino

Native (Swift/Kotlin)

Best when: You need maximum OS integration — HealthKit, Live Activities, AR depth APIs, hardware peripherals — or raw performance is critical. Best for apps where platform-specific capability is the core value proposition.

  • 100% platform API access
  • Best raw performance
  • HealthKit / ARKit depth
  • Live Activities (iOS)
  • Widgets & app extensions

Delivery approach

App Store in 3–8 weeks — tested on real devices, not simulators.

Five stages from discovery to store — with a commitment that the app performs on real user devices before it ships, not after.

01

Mobile Product Discovery

Week 1: define user journeys, platform choice rationale, AI feature prioritisation, and technical constraints (offline need, device targets, OS version floor). Output: feature list, architecture decision record, and a prioritised sprint plan.

02

Design & Prototyping

Week 1–2: mobile-first UI design in Figma — platform-appropriate patterns (iOS Human Interface Guidelines or Material Design 3), AI interaction flows, and an interactive prototype user-tested with 5 real users before a line of code is written.

03

Core App Build

Week 2–5: navigation, authentication, state management, API integration, and offline-first data layer. AI features developed in parallel — on-device models integrated, streaming APIs wired, personalisation engine seeded.

04

AI Feature Integration & Testing

Week 5–7: integrate all AI features into the live app experience. Performance profiling on real devices — not simulators. AI feature A/B testing against baseline. Automated E2E testing with Detox or Maestro across device matrix.

05

App Store Submission & Launch

Week 7–8: App Store and Play Store submission — screenshots, metadata, privacy nutrition labels, age ratings, and review notes. Monitoring setup (Sentry, Firebase Crashlytics), analytics dashboards, and a post-launch optimisation plan for the first 30 days.

Client outcomes

AI-powered mobile in production — across four industries.

Four organisations that replaced commodity mobile apps with intelligent applications — and the results that followed within the first quarter.

The Challenge

UK challenger bank with 1.4M active app users experiencing 28% monthly churn — users cited "the app doesn't understand me" in exit surveys. No personalisation, one-size-fits-all notifications, and a support experience that started with an FAQ chatbot users immediately tried to bypass.

What We Built

AI-powered mobile banking experience — on-device ML for spending pattern analysis (no data leaves the device), personalised insight cards surfaced at the right time, intelligent notification suppression based on user behaviour, and a React Native copilot integrated with Claude API that answers real questions about the user's own account.

28% → 9%monthly churn reduction in 90 days post-launch
4.1 → 4.7App Store rating improvement after AI copilot launch
£4.2Mestimated annual customer lifetime value recovered
Financial Services

UK challenger bank with 1.4M active app users experiencing 28% monthly churn — users cited "the app doesn't understand me" in exit surveys. No personalisation, one-size-fits-all notifications, and a support experience that started with an FAQ chatbot users immediately tried to bypass.

28% → 9%monthly churn reduction in 90 days post-launch
4.1 → 4.7App Store rating improvement after AI copilot launch
£4.2Mestimated annual customer lifetime value recovered
Healthcare & Life Sciences

NHS Trust needing a patient-facing mobile application for wound care management — patients photographing wounds at home for remote clinician review. Previous solution was WhatsApp photos, creating DSPT compliance issues, no structured data, and clinician time wasted on triage of low-quality images.

94%image quality acceptance rate — vs. 61% with previous WhatsApp approach
35 min → 8 minclinician review time per patient via structured AI-assisted triage
100%DSPT compliance achieved at first audit — zero legacy WhatsApp usage within 4 weeks
Retail & E-Commerce

Fashion retailer with 2.8M mobile users and a 3.4% product discovery rate — users browsing but not finding. No visual search, generic recommendations, and a search function that returned zero results for 23% of queries because users searched by style, not product name.

3.4% → 9.1%product discovery rate — 2.7× improvement from AI recommendations
£2.1Madditional annual revenue from improved mobile conversion
41%push notification engagement rate (up from 12%) via smart timing
Manufacturing & Field Services

Industrial equipment manufacturer deploying field service engineers to 4,000 sites annually. Engineers using printed manuals and phone calls to the office for technical support. 3.2-hour average job resolution time, 18% first-visit failure rate, and no offline capability when sites had no connectivity.

3.2h → 1.4haverage job resolution time — 56% reduction
18% → 6%first-visit failure rate — resolved with offline AI documentation
£1.8Mannual field service cost reduction across 180 engineers

Mobile engineering stack

Cross-PlatformReact Native (Expo)
Cross-PlatformFlutter (Dart)
iOS NativeSwift / SwiftUI
Android NativeKotlin / Jetpack Compose
On-Device AI (iOS)Core ML / Create ML
On-Device AITensorFlow Lite
Augmented RealityARKit / ARCore
AI StreamingVercel AI SDK (mobile)
Mobile CI/CDFastlane + EAS Build
BackendFirebase / Supabase
State ManagementRedux Toolkit / Zustand
Mobile E2E TestingDetox / Maestro

Mobile AI is not a feature — it's the difference between an app users keep and one they delete.

6.9B

smartphone users globally by 2025 — mobile is now the primary digital surface for most of the world, and the channel where AI-powered personalisation delivers the highest measurable ROI.

48%

higher user retention for AI-personalised mobile apps — personalisation based on real behaviour, not demographic segments, is the single most effective lever for mobile engagement.

25%

reduction in e-commerce returns when AR try-on is available in mobile — customers who visualise products in their own space return fewer, and buy more confidently.

56%

reduction in field service resolution time when engineers have AI-assisted offline documentation on mobile — the impact of AI is highest where connectivity is lowest.

Expert Insights for Smarter Digital Innovation

Insights from real-world engineering, cloud, and AI leaders - helping you make better decisions, faster.

Tell us what your app needs to do — we'll tell you how AI makes it exceptional.

Start with a free Mobile AI Opportunity Review — we'll look at your current app or your idea, identify the three AI features that would drive the most retention, and sketch an architecture that gets them to the App Store in weeks.