WWDC Stresses Apple's App Dominance

by Holly Shoemaker

Apple focused on mobile solutions at its 2012 Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) this week. While Apple, as expected, did not announce a release date for the next iPhone, the company took the time to rattle off statistics in its keynote address. The company also focused on Mountain Lion, its updated operating system, which should help Apple continue to dominate the market.

App Store Numbers at a Glance

 

At the conference, Apple stressed the following statistics:

• The App Store is available in 155 countries.
• Apple had paid $5 billion to developers for App Store downloads.
• Users have downloaded 30 billion apps from the App Store.
• The App Store has 400 million accounts.
• A total of 650,000 apps are now available in the App Store – 225,000 of them were specifically designed for the iPad.

According to Gartner, Inc., an information technology research and advisory company, the App Store should generate $58 billion in sales by 2014. By providing the above statistics, Apple gave concrete reasons as to why developers should continue to make apps for Apple. After all, developers need to meet goals and make profits too.

How Google Play and Facebook Compare

• The Google Play store, formally the Android Market, has more than 500,000 apps available.
• Facebook opened its App Center to users on June 8, 2012. The App Center opened with about 600 apps. The App Center is available on the web, iOS and Google's Android operating systems. Last month, Facebook reported that it sent users to Apple's App Store 83 million times.

Concluding Thoughts

While much of the focus at the WWDC came as no surprise, Apple's focus clearly showed the company believes it will continue to dominant app downloads and sales. Even OS X Mountain Lion brings features like messaging and apps from the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch to the Mac. Developers received a preview of Mountain Lion back in February. In July 2012, users may purchase Mountain Lion in the Mac App Store for $19.99.