Note to myself: much of the likely audience here are going to be focused on apps that are *not* terribly innovative -- they're really business plays, doing something in well-established niches in fairly conventional ways. They are going to have a strong incentive to outsource the application development, and that's not a *terrible* idea. Talk about the pros and cons of outsourcing:

-- Pro: if you are building something similar to what a consulting company has already built, they may have much of the expertise and tech staff ready to roll.
-- Con: you probably aren't their only customer, and their attention will, likely, be split.
-- Pro: your uncertainty is somewhat reduced if you can hire an experienced team who have done something similar to this before.
-- Con: make sure you own your IP! Don't wind up forever dependent on a third party!
-- Con: odds are good that you will wind up with no in-house expertise about the tech. If so, make sure you are *very* comfortable with the relationship here. No matter how good it is, the app will require ongoing maintenance and enhancement: make sure you know how that works.
-- Be very cautious about off-shoring. Do not underestimate the communication challenges involved in working with a team in India or Russia, both in term of language and timezones. *Many* projects fail because they are too optimistic about this, and even the successful ones often find that they don't wind up saving nearly as much as they had expected, overall.

Other points, pro and con?