Mobile Apps Are A 4 Billion Dollars Business, 99.4% Owned By Apple
You folks all know by now that mobile apps are a huge business. On top of Apple's App Store own incredible growth, we're witnessing the emergence of App distribution platforms pretty much everywhere those days, all the way to cars.
All of this is not happening without reasons. According to the latest report from market research firm Gartner, the App Store business in 2009 generated an incredible 4.2 billion dollars in sales. And the trend is also definitely upwards.
If their projections hold, nearly 30 billion dollars will be spent on mobile apps every year by 2013.
Furthermore, still according to them, Apple is at the moment in a quasi-monopolistic situation, owning over 99% of the market. A situation resulting from their first-mover advantage that should however soften over time, still leaving them with over two thirds of the market by 2013.
Lastly, the growing trend for ad-supported apps should lead to 25% of those revenue to originate from in-app advertising, thus Quattro's acquisition.
The big unsolved question here is however who will profit from this? Apple, that's a given, indies or big name developers? Only the future will tell.
[via Ars Technica]
