Sprint adds GetJar's free mobile apps catalog

Sprint announced a partnership with GetJar to offer the independent app store's 60,000-plus free applications to all feature phone subscribers as well as BlackBerry and Windows Mobile smartphone users. According to Sprint, a link to the GetJar catalog is now live on the Sprint portal across most of its handsets--the GetJar site boasts popular applications including Facebook Mobile, Google Maps, YouTube, Weather Channel Mobile, ShopSavvy and Loopt. Consumers worldwide have already downloaded more than 750 million GetJar apps.

"We've been fairly open about our views on storefronts--we want to provide the greatest amount of choice and support operating systems, as opposed to our own proprietary storefront," said Sprint director of product management and development Kevin McGinnis in an interview with FierceMobileContent. "GetJar offers a large catalog of free apps, which affords us the opportunity to provide the greatest range of options for our customers."

While GetJar has previously forged similar agreements with carrier 3UK and handset maker Sony Ericsson, the Sprint partnership is its first deal with a U.S. operator. "Carriers and phone makers realize they don't have to own their own app stores--what's really important is to give access to applications to consumers," GetJar founder and CEO Ilja Laurs told FMC. "It's not in the spirit of the American tradition to force consumers to shop in one place, so it's very rewarding to see an American carrier offering this kind of choice."

Laurs adds that the Sprint partnership should greatly benefit GetJar's developer partners as well. "Fragmentation makes it difficult for developers to build a successful business," he said. "These kinds of deals are islands of homogeneousness that simplify many of their efforts, because they no longer have to support hundreds of different handsets and multiple operating system options."

For more on the Sprint/GetJar deal:
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