The phenomenon of application stores.
Thursday, May 21st, 2009 by Giuseppe PiersantelliApple iTunes App Store’s huge success is encouraging many players to launch similiar initiatives with the gola to distribute and sell mobile applicationsfor devices running operating systems like Windows Mobile or Blackberry.
These small softwares, which often satisfy the needs of a niche of users (according to the Long Tail principle), are usually developed by independent third parties. The initiative owner certify and distribute the applications in a trusted environment.
The following chart, elaborated by Future Centre, summarizes the main mobile application stores currently available or close to the launch.
So far, iTunes App Store is still the more consolidated and popular marketplace for mobile applications but some more players are emerging.
Blackberry has unveiled its App World. The promotional video is quite interesting.
Nokia Ovi Store: the Scandinavian giant adds the application marketplace to the popular suite Ovi. Reportedly, 20.000 applications will be delivered.
Android Market delivers a complete set of software for mobile devices: an operating system, middleware and key mobile applications. The Android Software Development Kit (SDK) is also available.
Windows Marketplace seems alive and kicking: applications are available for Windows Mobile OS.
But what can I do if I own a J2ME phone and I want some fancy applications without buying a brand new Blackberry? No problem: Sun Microsystems is planning to launch its application store dedicated to the 2.1 billion Java based phones in the world. “Candidate applications will be submitted via a simple web site, evaluated by Sun for safety and content, then presented under free or fee terms to the broad Java audience via our update mechanism. Over time, developers will bid for position on our storefront, and the relationships won’t be exclusive (as they have been for search),” said Sun CEO.
Also the global mobile carrier Vodafone decided to invest some R&D resource in Betavine, “an open community and mobile development resource hub”. Differently from the other stores, which are dedicated to a particular operating system, Betavine delivers applications for all the existing mobile platforms.
The following chart, elaborated by VisionMobile Research, is a comparison table of application stores including BREW, Handango, GetJar and Download.
It looks like the business of distributing applications for an increasing number of open and/or flexible mobile platform is attracting a huge number of players with different role in the mobile services ecosystems: alliances, developers, operators.
Apple teaches that large corporations like Microsoft or Vodafone are too slow to develop small, niche applications, but the business is profitable: so the right approach is being a trusted aggregator which distributes (and sells) applications developed bysmall, flexible, cost efficient independents firms or even individuals.
The big corporations take their part to aggregate and distribute the software. The independent developers have hige stores to sell their softwares. The end users are finally able to find their favourite, freshly developed gadgets for their mobile phones.
Is it really a win-win game?
Tags: app store, application store, cell phone, itunes
May 21st, 2009 at 7:25 pm
For Apple yes it’s a W2W game because it sells a lot of Iphone; for the Telco is a business also because to use an Iphone it’s necessary a network.
I think that this trend will be the same of the SW in the computer: at the begining the SW applications were expansive but now you can find a lot of applications for free.
I mean, now there are some revenues from these mobile apps but in the future no; the application adds value to the terminal and it increase sells but the revenues from SW is only a residual component…
May 24th, 2009 at 1:37 pm
Interesting post. Lot to think about.
It looks to me that this is at first glance a win to win relation. The Big Guy would not be able to produce all those apps and their cost would be off range for the market.
By enabling other to piggy back on its product it opens the door to value creation and it is going to benefit from that, besides any amount of money made through revenue share.
The small fish is also getting an opportunity to make money that would not be possible in a usual market. So, everybody wins!
Actually….just may be.
Out of the thousands of developers only a few will make real money, most won’t even get even. It is like a lottery: everybody can have fun (in hoping for the big win) but in reality just a handful win and all the others lose (their time, effort…).
The only sure winner is the Big Guy.
September 2nd, 2009 at 12:11 pm
[...] model and deployed by mobile phones manufacturers, software vendors and mobile network operators. Here and here you can find previous entries about Nokia Ovi, Vodafone, Windows Marketplace and [...]