Billion Dollar Apps Industry Surging

The apps industry is at its peak six years after it has been introduced in the global market. Now that the app industry is worth billions of dollars, it would have surprised many doubters – those who in 2007 raised their eyebrows or predicted that nothing would come out of it. They could not have been proven more wrong.

No one could have predicted how things would turn out for the app industry. The optimism was high, but the risks were considerable. However, this year, it can only be expected that apps would continue to rule the day (or the year, for that matter) since the prediction for mobile phone app sales is projected to increase 62% from last year’s figures. Simplified, that’s around $25 billion total—a rather hefty sum on all accounts.

Impressive App Stats

There are now roughly 700,000 apps shared between Apple and Android users. There are others designed for other OS and the final count is rather hard to determine. Given the trend, more are definitely being developed especially since new studies are providing interesting and useful insights on the behaviors of app users. It has been determined that as of December 2012 in the United States alone, mobile platform users were using apps at an average of 127 minute per day, or roughly 11 hours out of 24 each day.

And apps are keeping people busy in another way. Since apps were first released in the year 2007, a total of 466, 000 new jobs emerged in the United States alone. This data was reported by TechNet based on a study conducted in 2012.

Contributing factors

Much of the success of apps is largely attributed to the exponential increase in the use of mobile platforms, particularly Apple and Android-based devices. In both developed and developing countries, smartphones and tablets need not to be expensive. And all of them are ready for apps installation, though for some the options and possibilities are limited.

The projections are even more encouraging since 919 million smartphones are expected to be shipped throughout the globe this year alone. This only means that millions more people will soon use apps, and with high demand and newer technologies, there are definitely more apps to expect in the future.

High demands and greater challenges

A mobile analytics firm reports that China tops the list of countries with the highest demand for Android and iOS tablets and smartphones this year.

As other countries join in the hype, more people are trying their hand at developing applications that just might make them rich. But not everyone is successful in this attempt, since consumers only patronize apps that are well-designed and work successfully with the basic features of smartphones and tablets. An app with too many glitches would not survive another day, so to speak. But apps that are easy to install and use, pique the imagination, and provides assistance to everyday tasks are very likely to hit the big leagues.