Apps and the app industry have seen a lot of news coverage, lately. From app developers showing 100 percent transparency about their numbers to reports being released on the Apple App economy.

But a lot of the growth this market will probably see still lies more or less far ahead of us, starting in 2010, but probably seeing strong growth until 2013 or even further. The most recent attempts in predictions where the market is going come from Gartner.

Regarding App Store revenues and downloads, Gartner foresees:

• 2010: 4.5 billion apps downloaded, for a total of $6.8 billion in revenue

• 2013: 21.6 billion apps will be downloaded, for a total of $29.5 billion in revenue

 
Download Free/Paid-ratio:

• 2010: 3.7 billion (82%) free app downloads and about 800 million (18%) paid downloads

• 2013: 18.8 billion (87%) free app downloads and 2.8 billion (13%) paid app download

 
Just by looking at these numbers, one would think that free is the way to go. And maybe that is so. The question, then, remains where all the revenue will come from. Gartner splits its revenue predictions between end-user spending and advertising revenue as follows:

• 2010:  about $6.2 (91%) billion in end-user spending and 600 million (9%) in advertising revenue

• 2013: about $23 billion (78%) in end-user spending and 6.5 (22%) billion in advertising revenue

 
First of all, these numbers imply that in-app advertising (as part of mobile advertising) is pretty big business.  The fact that many big players in the mobile space are positioning themselves to take a piece of that market right now (Google/Abmob, Apple/Quattro and Opera/AdMarvel) further substantiates this.

It also means that for any app-developer and mobile publisher, there is a chance to create a profitable business out of advertising revenues. This will probably work better for some then for others, but, in our opinion, it is a pretty save bet that mobile advertising is here to stay.

Furthermore, although Gartner does not further go into detail about “end-user spending”, it is clear that up-sale (full versions, extra levels, virtual goods etc.) will make up a large part of end-user spending. So again, for many app-developers (especially in gaming) this may be the way to go.

And of course, for “some”, simply selling the app is an option as well.

As an opinion, a market seeing such a strong growth within just a few years will probably look completely different from what it is looking like right now. New means of increasing end-user spending will pop up, supporting industries and sectors (payments, for example) will pop-up. Furthermore App Store themselves will evolve as competition between them increases (more openness might be a consequence of this).

As a bottom line, the study (even if far off) implies something we believe is very true: apps in general are big business.

And we are glad to be part of it.

• It’s an HTC (HTC Passion)

• Running on Android 2.0.1 with new 3D features to the app tray

• More home screens

• Grid icon that, when pressed, previews all the homescreen pages

• US-Operator: T-Mobile

• Wifi

• It comes loaded with Google-owned programs – among them maps and the new Google Goggles

 
Find more infos and pics on it over at engadget. It will be interesting to see how this plays out for Google. Maybe in a few years we’ll have it loaded up with a portfolio of 20 or more Google products – try to compete with that. Again, it looks like a really cool phone, we’ll update this post if we get our hands on some more details.

Apart from apprupt, here’s what the iPhone world has been through this last week:

• We’ll let Techrcunch do the wording on this one: “App Store Apps Finally Get Prettier Pages” – Indeed!
• Apple introduces Rewind 2009, for the best apps of 2009 – are your favorites among them?
• It has really been an “Apple-intense” week, it seems. Besides “Rewind” and the new App Store layout, they also pulled more than one thousand apps from the App Store for review fakes. They all came from the same developer.
• Not to forget, Apple countersued Nokia over a few patents (actually 13) while in China iPhone sales hit 100,000 – this really was a busy week for them
• Moving away from Apple and even the iPhone, this article refers to a study that claims that in 2010, more than 50 Android phones will be shipped – that’s an impressive amount of different phone models. The downside is, of course, the good old device-fragmentation.
• Calling it a “weird little slice of research” probably sums it up best, but we still would not want you to miss this study: “iPhone users suffering from ‘Stockholm Syndrome’, analyst firm reckons”.

 
Since this week was full of notable news, we probably have missed a few ones – forgive us and have a great weekend!

Here’s a short summary of what we found interesting in it:

• The IDC predicts that in 2010, more than 1 billion mobile devices will be accessing the internet, compared to 1.3 billion PCs, which basically means mobile is growing 2.5 times faster than the stationary internet
• We will have at least 300.000 iPhone apps by the end of 2010. A lot of them will come from Global 2000 businesses and consumer brands. An interesting implication for who the players on these and other platforms will be
• Android is coming up strong…kind of: 50,000- 75,000 apps for Android by end of 2010. Quite a number.
• The “iPad” will arrive! Finally, an Apple tablet. The size will be rather like “an oversized iPod Touch than a downsized Mac”, but still, the potential here is huge.
• Over 200 million smartphones (or devices with the ability to run third-party applications) will be shipped in 2010. That is some market share growth and it likely will not stop. While it will be at 16% in 2010, until 2012 the IDC estimates it will reach 20%.
• Prices for smartphones will continue to drop: “look for more sub-$150 smartphone to come on the scene in 2010, accelerating the market”.

 
So there you have it: mobile is here and we are in the middle of a lot of changes and developments. Exciting!

Anyways, here is what you might or might not have missed these last 7 days.

• Dutch eBuddy has launched a premium iPhone app – not the cheapest, so it will be interesting how this plays out for them
• In the U.S., mobile titles now make up 3 percent of overall gaming spending – this number is sure to grow even more in the future
• App Store traffic massively increased over Thanksgiving week(end) – holidays in general appear to be a great chance for you to push your app sales. Here’s another good example.
• Gizmodo has the best iPhone apps of the week for you
• Not directly iPhone related: Apple has acquired LaLa, rumors are the reason was LaLa’s engineering talent.
• And if you happen to be at or somewhere near the University of Michigan on the 9th of december, don’t miss the iPhone Orchestra live-performance

 
Have a great weekend!

For many of you, the truth is probably somewhere in between. If you still have a “normal” day job, you consider it a hobby with the potential of earning some extra income, and developing something that people buy and use is rewarding in many ways, of course. Some of you may aim to become a full time iPhone app developer in the future but are not ready to take that step just yet. Of course, there are the pros amongst app developers that are either small (one or a few devs) or large companies and are all about growing their core business metrics.

Just recently, two pretty successful German developers founded what is now the first and (to our knowledge) only Association for German iPhone App Developers (called viEdA). The two developers know their business pretty well and the reasons for creating such an association are pretty clear. Among other goals, the association aims to alleviate the problem of being discovered among the huge number of apps in the App Store and lobby for the combined interests of their members. One of the founders of the viEda estimates potential amount of professional iPhone developers in Germany at around 150, though a clear definition of what exactly the word “professional” constitutes regarding iPhone app development has not been found, yet (German readers, find more about it here).

150? Sounds like a rather small amount, don’t you think?

If we consider all the iPhone app developers that spend their free time working on app projects, trying to create successful products and looking for more effective ways of getting to their target group, our guess is we will find a lot more than 150 people who would then be considered professional.

At apprupt, we aim to professionalize a part of the work that needs to be done when developing an app and then trying to sell it – the marketing.

But, of course, there is a difference here. Trying to go about developing an app in the most professional way does not necessarily make you a professional, right?

So what does? Is it making a living out of iPhone development? Is it full-time app development? Is it simply developing apps on a regular basis? Or could it just be going about the development of iPhone apps in professional way?

What do you think? Let us know in the comments.

Ap(p)art from that, these are other news that seemed important to us this last week:

• The iPhone goes China. Will it prevail?
• This chart shows a trend that cannot be ignored
• Layer finds an investor, while Stalquer finds a new way of knowing where you are
• Today game classic Doom went live on the App Store and if you’re looking for a time saver, have this app transate for you while you speak
• For your weekend reading, this is an awesome piece on the next two years for App Stores

 
Any other insights we’ve missed that you’d like to share?

At this point, there are about 710 million overall cellular subscribers in China, so even if just a fraction of them goes and buys an iPhone, it means a substantial increase in potential users to reach with your app. It is exciting to see how quickly a single iPhone developer can go international through the App Store. However, there are still many questions to be answered in this regard. Internationalization (language and, if possible, product features) and pricing are, among many others, challenges that a developer will certainly face. The same holds true for marketing your app in different nations.

Again, of course, we are at the beginning of an ongoing development here. Right now, it might be enough for you to focus your marketing on the biggest market (the U.S.) or that of your home country.

But in general, influence of nationality on the effectiveness of different marketing channels is one thing that we will definitely focus on in the future. This can become complex quite quickly. There is a lot to learn here and we think that finding out what works and what does not in which country in terms of marketing performance will become more and more important. If you think mid- to long-term and aim to gather knowledge on how and where to optimize your marketing and thus your own business profitability, this is a topic you cannot ignore. Neither can we.

So , bottom line, to us the iPhone being sold in China seems like a huge step for the entire mobile industry and we are curious how things will develop throughout the next months and years.

It is as interesting thought that app development seems to be becoming more attractive and less attractive at the same time, these days. While the number of app downloads is speeding up, new potential revenue streams are opening up to developers and iPhone market share (as well as smartphone market share overall) is driving higher and higher (we wonder what is going to happen once operator exclusivity ends, if it does), it is becoming increasingly difficult for an app to get the users attention and for a developer to make a profitable business out of developing apps.

One fact that we think is often overseen is, that wide iPhone adoption poses the chance to develop for a steep target group, a special interest, a niche – in short: as in every mass market, the app long tail will get longer and longer (or bigger and bigger). In our opinion this hold true for every app category, even for games. We see a huge upside for developers in this. The challenge then lies in finding your target group and letting them know you have something that could be of interest to them. You can try just putting it up on the App Store, but our guess is you’ll need some extra promotion. You most probably have an idea of where you’ll find your most eager customer – but in the end you need data to support this, right?

What is your strategy? Have you found channels that seem to work for you already?

The impact of in-app purchase for free apps was widely discussed, numbers (or opinions?) on the future of mobile at the Web 2.0 summit in San Francisco were revealed and… well… Apple was sued – by Nokia.

So here’s this last week’s roundup:

• Mobilemarketingmagazine talks about apprupt – great news!

• 148apps has an awesome piece on in-app purchase for free apps and its impact on their site.

• Morgan Stanley talks about the economy and internet trends (mobile is really going to take off – we suspected that). Find their slide deck of the presentation at the Web 2.0 Summit here. As a time saver, Techcrunch sums it up pretty well.

• Businessweek lets us know that the app ecomony is huge.

• Nokia sues Apple

• iPhone app “objectively” evaluates how good you are in bed, while Pepsi pulls its own app off the App Store

• VentureBeat contemplates why location based networks won’t grow. Great weekend read!

• For our German readers, here are some rumors on the iPhone 4G.

 
What else was noteworthy? Let us know in the comments!