Mobile Apps Heat - A Rising Trend of Today

Millions of Apps are downloaded everyday to mobiles, and millions more are getting developed simultaneously.

What are these apps, and why are they gaining widespread adoption in the business world?

Experience the power of mobile apps... Apps are end-user software applications that are designed for a cell phone operating system which extend the phone’s capabilities by allowing users to perform specific tasks. With the widespread acceptance of mobile technology, there has also been a steep increase in the development of application software that offers simple and effective communication and collaboration tools.

Among the most popular are apps that provide some form of entertainment like games, or apps related to music, food, travel and sports, as well as those that help people find information they need and accomplish tasks, like maps and navigation, weather, news, banking etc. The emergence of this pervasive technology is shifting the way people interact, share and take advantage of the huge sets of material that are generated for the Internet.

This shift in the usage of mobile apps is due primarily to the increasing consumer interest in smart phones, blended along with the participation of Internet players in ‘mobile space’, as well as the upcoming numbers of application stores. Also, added to all this is the cross-industry services. Every player in this industry is believed to influence how the application is delivered and experienced by consumers.

In a release, Stephanie Atkinson, managing partner and principal analyst at Compass Intelligence, said, “The need to access day-to-day applications from remote locations or from mobile devices, the need to collaborate and share files with coworkers across the globe, the growing demand to have better productivity tools remotely, and lastly the general growth in mobile and remote workers drives the need for remote/ mobile applications across businesses and industries.”

There is a nowadays a huge opportunity in the mobile applications market. From multiple vendors to wireless service providers to the device manufacturers, all are betting on this increasing culture. Software companies are enhancing their innovations in the telecommunications industry. The biggest challenge today lies in clearly understanding the end-user’s needs across different sizes of business and across various industries.

Major players in this industry

Since the opening of the Apple Store, entrepreneurs and other companies have also been trying their luck. Android apps are as well gaining momentum as the choice of several users. With the strong support of Google, they have taken a firm grip ahead of some of the other lead operating systems. The Android Market has sprouted up by 127% since last August, putting it at three times the growth of the Apple App Store, according to the second report released by the mobile security company Lookout and its App Genome Project, which has analyzed more than 500,000 Android and iOS applications since the project commenced last summer.

The Apple App Store in 2010 is said to have generated $1.8 billion in revenue, giving it an 82.7% share of the total market, down from 92.8% in 2009. Revenue for the Apple App Store rose 131.9% from $768.7 billion in 2009. Global revenue for the total mobile application store market in 2010 is said to have increased by 160.2% to reach $2.2 billion, up from $828 million in 2009. With several options for accessing information while on the go, employees can be productive with Google Apps even when they’re not at their desks. At no extra charge, Google Apps supports over-theair mobile access on BlackBerry devices, the iPhone, Windows Mobile, Android and many less powerful phones. Irrespective of whether one needs a CRM, accounting or project management app, the Google apps marketplace helps one discover, purchase and deploy top web apps that integrate with Google Apps. Google’s Android Market reportedly has made the most dramatic advance, with revenue soaring 861.5% for the year. This has enabled the Android Market to take a 4.7% share of global mobile application store revenue in 2010, up from 1.3% in 2009. However, Apple is expected to retain more than half of the market revenue, at least through 2014.

Nokia’s OVI Store posted the second strongest growth rate in 2010, with revenue rising by 719.4%, giving it a 4.9% share of the application market business, up from 1.5% in 2009. Research In Motion’s BlackBerry App World retained its No. 2 rank with 360.3% growth. The company’s share increased to 7.7% in 2010, up from 4.3% in 2009.

Mobile service operators led by Reliance Communications (RCom) and Idea Cellular are betting that applications for mobiles, the new craze, would help them break the glass barrier of revenues from value-added services. Idea Cellular has just inked a deal with Ericsson AB to launch an applications store, Reliance App World. “Twenty per cent of India’s existing subscriber base currently pays for applications, which shows the kind of potential the industry has for growing these revenues,” said Prashant Gokarn, business head - 3G at Reliance Communications.

Other operators such as Uninor have found in other markets like Pakistan that allowing customers to use the mobile for apps such as remittances and payments has dramatically reduced subscriber churn and built customer loyalty. “In roughly around a week of its launch, despite no commercial promotions, our app store has seen almost 30,000 hits per day,” said Ambrish P Jain, director - operations at Idea Cellular.

To hook users, Idea is offering for free 15-20 per cent of the 30,000 apps it has in its store. Idea, whose existing app store products can be downloaded on around 500 models of GPRS-enabled handsets, plans to make available as many as a million apps over time.

Global apps market

Dallas-based researcher MarketsandMarkets is projecting that by 2015 that the global app market will reach $25 billion, up from $6.8 billion in 2010, growing at a compound annual growth rate of nearly 30% between 2009 through 2014. North America was the largest app market in 2009 with 41.6% of revenue. But Asia led the way in terms of numbers of downloads. The researchers project that Europe will be the leading market in 2015, with a 34% compound annual growth rate between 2010 and 2015.

Apple and other OEMs are providing free and simple-to-use development tools for their handsets and are offering developer support programs for training, technical and business support, along with a web- based medium to sell the applications.

Gartner, Inc. recently identified the top 10 consumer mobile applications for 2012. “Consumer mobile applications and services are no longer the prerogative of mobile carriers,” said Sandy Shen, research director at Gartner. Money Transfer, Location-Based Services, Mobile Search, Mobile Browsing, Mobile Health Monitoring, Mobile Payment, Near Field Communication Services, Mobile Advertising, Mobile Instant Messaging, Mobile Music, etc., are the top consumer mobile apps that are sought after globally.”

Apps have no doubt redefined both usability and interaction on mobile phones, most importantly with the touchscreen devices and the new wave of tablets. But all this extended customer experience and comfort comes at a price, which includes maintenance, development and distribution costs, along with the necessity to rely on app stores for updating. But as mobile connectivity grows, the customer is definitely going to be a winner.

At the Mobile World Congress 2011 in Barcelona, Global Mobile App Awards were give out and the App of the Year on the Apple Platform went to Rovio/Clickgamer/ Chillingo for Angry Birds; App of the Year on the BlackBerry App World Platform went to Research In Motion for BlackBerry Messenger; App of the Year on the Android Platform went to Google for Google Maps; App of the Year on the Nokia Platform went to Herocraft & InnerActive for Zum Zum, and the Best Mobile App award went to Rovio/ Clickgamer/Chillingo for Angry Birds.

During the fourth quarter of 2010, smartphone sales have been reported to have topped those of personal computers for the first time ever. A total of 101 million smartphones were purchased, compared to 92 million PCs. This accounted for around an 87% increase quarter-over-quarter in smartphone sales, compared to the 3% increase in PC shipments. With the advent of 4G and high improvements in delivery, there is more in store for customers to score well in terms of high end entertainment and experience via their mobile phone.

So what’s next?

With the apps market hitting its stride and ready to surge, the pressure is now on the developers and operators, which places a stress on the technology axis. Namely, will it grow or take a curve? The future will tell.