mobileSQUARED

Mobile revolutionary Apple is on target to pass the 1 billion app downloads in the afternoon (GMT) of April 23rd, according to research by mobile^SQUARED. Presently, the company is experiencing average daily downloads of 5.1 million apps and requires another 38 million apps to reach 1 billion. At this existing download rate that will take another seven days.

At the start of December Apple announced that it has passed the 200 million download mark. And this was promptly followed by a similar announcement of 500 million downloads by January 19th.

It took Apple almost 6 months to reach its first 500 million app downloads and the following 500 million downloads in just 94 days. That equates to an improved average daily download figure of 2.98 million for the first 500 million to 5.32 million per day for the second 500 million downloads.

Research by mobile^SQUARED has revealed that around 75% of apps downloaded are free. Of those paid-for apps, price ranges from US$0.99-999 with an average cost per download of around US$2.20. On April 23rd the average number of paid-for downloads will reach 250 million generating revenues of US$550 million. Based on Apple’s 30-70 revenue share model, apps have generated an additional US$165 million to Apple’s deep coffers and US$385 million to the developer and publisher community.

However, one of the major drawbacks of the App Store is that it has a restricted market. Globally, the iPhone accounts for 0.4% of the total mobile market and around 2% in the UK. But consumer research by mobile^SQUARED has revealed a growing awareness of the App Store concept among UK mobile citizens.

A survey of 1,000 UK consumers – a representative sample – conducted by Lightspeed Research for mobile^SQUARED, revealed that 24.2% of respondents knew what an App Store was, with awareness higher among males (35.1%) than females (14.5%). Fifty two percent of respondents aged between 18-24 years knew what at App Store was, as did 45.1% of 25-34 year olds, 30% of 35-44 year olds and 18% of 45-54 year olds. What’s more this awareness correlates to smartphone penetration in the UK.

When the phrase ‘App Store’ was swapped with ‘one area’ housing content and Internet bookmarks, in total 45.8% of respondents said they would use this ‘one area’ (ie app store), greatly exceeding the number of smartphone users in the UK. Again, the concept is more appealing to males (48%) than females (43.8%). What’s more, the appeal of this ‘one area’ crosses demographic boundaries also, with 68% and 69% of 18-24 year olds and 25-34 year olds, respectively, expressing an interest, as well as almost 50% of respondents aged between 35-54 years.

This demonstrates that the appeal of the app store is not, and should not be, restricted to just the high-end phone users. There is a compelling case to ensure app stores achieve mass market distribution.