A market study published today by the people from Canalys puts a little in perspective the market of applications for mobile terminals, as it evolved in the first 3 months of 2013. According to Canalys, App Store, Google Play, Blackberry World si Windows Phone Store they generated 13.4 billion downloads and 2.2 billion dollars in receipts. Google Play generated 51% of downloads, 6.8 billion, while the App Store generated 74% of receipts, i.e. 1.6 billion dollars. The analysis was done on virtual application stores from 50 countries around the world and represents as well as possible the current market situation.
Some of the strongest growth was seen in emerging markets, such as South Africa, Brazil and Indonesia, helped not least by the growing base of smart device users in those countries. But robust growth, both in terms of revenue and download volumes, was seen in mature mobility markets, such as North America, up 8% and 6% respectively, and Western Europe, up 8% and 10% in Q1. Worldwide, Apple's App Store accounted for the largest indexed proportion of revenue between the four stores, at around 74%, while the Google Play store saw the greatest number of downloads, accounting for about 51% of the stores' collective total, with Apple close behind.
Compared to Q4 2012, the figures represent an increase of 11% in terms of the number of downloads and a 9% increase in terms of sales. For now, Apple maintains its leading position in terms of generating money for its developers, but the larger number of Android terminals generates more downloads, although the revenues are clearly lower. Windows Phone Store and BlackBerry World remain for the time being with much fewer listed applications and modest results, both in terms of downloads and in terms of revenue.
