2009 Year in Review: Mobile application storefronts multiply like rabbits

The breakout success of Apple's App Store made it inevitable that rivals would introduce branded mobile content storefronts of their own--in the wake of Google's competing Android Market, launched late last year, the floodgates opened wide in 2009. Both Nokia and Microsoft announced their own branded storefronts during Mobile World Congress in mid-February: Nokia's Ovi Store, which opened in late May, consolidates the handset giant's earlier Download!, Mosh and WidSets efforts, touting a customized and contextually relevant user experience determined by factors like personal contacts and physical whereabouts (or as Nokia calls it, "Social Location"). Consumers can activate social discovery features to receive updates and recommendations on content enjoyed within their social networking circles--in addition, Ovi Store will present content and applications tied to the user's present location. The Social Location concept continues to pose challenges, however--in late October, Forum Nokia senior services marketing manager Bill Perry admitted the manufacturer is "still shoring things up. Next year, our goal is to have a cohesive relevancy experience. When you're dealing with consumers' purchasing habits, you can't just flip a switch to make everything happen. But we are seeing user trends emerge as more applications get in to the store." In December, Nokia said it is now rebuilding Ovi Store to emphasize enhanced speed and reliability as well as an improved user interface--the company adds that downloads are now approaching 1 million a day, and growing 100 percent month-over-month.

As for Microsoft, its Windows Marketplace for Mobile didn't open for business until October, in conjunction with the release of the new Windows Mobile 6.5 operating system. Microsoft extended support to devices running the Windows Mobile 6.0 and 6.1 operating systems in November, expanding the store's reach to more than 30 million devices worldwide--even so, Windows Marketplace for Mobile has been slow to take off, launching with fewer than 250 applications (although that number more than tripled in the first month). Microsoft has not yet disclosed download metrics or related usage data.

A few weeks after Mobile World Congress, Research In Motion unveiled its BlackBerry App World during CTIA Wireless 2009. Promising a broad cross-section of personal and business applications for BlackBerry smartphones, BlackBerry App World opened with about 1,000 apps--the number doubled to 2,000 by July, but the storefront remains a work in progress. One major step forward: During its BlackBerry Developer Conference 2009 event in November, RIM said it will introduce carrier billing and in-app payment options to App World in 2010.

Operators are now embracing the app store approach as well. During its first Verizon Developer Community event in late July, Verizon Wireless announced VCast Apps, slated to go live sometime prior to year's end across BlackBerry smartphones, with additional operating systems and devices to follow. VCast Apps promises to complement application efforts from partners like RIM and Microsoft, not conflict with them, according to Verizon Wireless CMO John Stratton. "Those platforms are developed and those SDKs are established--we do not intend to create our own SDK and create further fragmentation," Stratton explained. "Instead, we want to complement and enhance those environments with tools that make it easier to consume applications." What VCast Apps offers is scope and reach--Verizon Wireless said it will complement its existing on-device portal with a new online portal to better distribute and promote smartphone applications. VCast Apps also promises developers a set of open network APIs compatible with the underlying SDK for all supported operating systems, giving programmers access to a wealth of network-specific data.

At the end of October, Sprint Nextel announced it will introduce a new, more open mobile application storefront in the first quarter of 2010. In tandem with the unnamed app store, Sprint will remove its own on-deck offering from future BlackBerry and Windows Mobile 6.5 handsets, much as its current Android and Palm webOS smartphones ship embedded with app stores unique to their respective operating systems. And earlier this month, European operator Orange announced the introduction of its Orange App Shop, promising subscribers in the U.K. and France one-click homescreen access to more than 5,000 applications, games, ringtones and wallpapers. The storefront is available across a range of handsets including Java, Android, Blackberry, Symbian and Windows Mobile devices, and includes services like Orange TV, Orange Games and Orange Maps alongside software from third-party developer partners.

Given the multitude of branded storefronts vying for consumers' attention, it's easy to forget about independent app portals like GetJar, yet the company has quietly emerged as the App Store's biggest rival in terms of download numbers. Monthly downloads on cross-platform GetJar topped 55 million in October 2009, a 40 million year-over-year increase, and in July, total GetJar downloads to date exceeded half a billion. The store now boasts about 50,000 mobile applications available in more than 200 different countries and optimized across roughly 1,700 handsets, including a multitude of feature phone models ignored by most other app storefronts--even though feature phones still represent more than two thirds of all new handset sales in the U.S. alone.