If I told you that Apple would take over two-thirds of app market revenues this year, would you be surprised? You shouldn’t be. After all, its app market is much bigger than the Android Market, BlackBerry App World, Windows Phone marketplace and webOS’ app store. Apple has also hit some impressive milestones with the iTunes App Store, selling billions of apps and raking in millions of dollars. It’s hard to imagine anyone else catching up any time soon. Add to that the increasing number of iOS devices Apple sells every quarter and it seems like it’s not really even a race anymore.
All Things D reports:
In 2009, combined revenues for the Big Four app stores–Apple’s App Store, Google’s Android Market, Nokia’s Ovi Store and Research In Motion’s BlackBerry App World–were about $830.6 million, according to IHS iSuppli. By 2010, they’d risen to $2.1 billion. And by the end of 2011, they’re expected to hit $3.8 billion.
If that growth trend continues they’ll balloon to $8.3 billion by 2014.
That is some tremendous growth for a market that has really only been around for three years. Prior to Apple’s iTunes App Store, other app markets were largely unheard of to the general public.
Apple’s huge lead certainly wasn’t helped by some sentiment in the industry that mimicked Jim Balsillie’s when he said that apps are a passing fad, and that the mobile browser is where it’s at. It’s indicative of BlackBerry’s own state of third-party app support, or the lack of it, especially for its new PlayBook.
[Via: All Things D]