Verizon Wireless’ V Cast Apps Store quietly launched this week amid a sea of competition.
Non-carrier app stores jumped from a mere eight to 38 last year, according to Chetan Sharma Consulting. Apple's App Store now boasts more than 100,000 downloadable apps. Even the Android Marketplace says its inventory is in the respectable 30,000-40,000 range.
Regardless of how far behind Verizon may be, it's clear from the company's courting of developers over the last year that it is serious about giving its customers access to apps and grabbing at least a small share of the profits. Initially, the store will launch on the BlackBerry Storm 2 with about 300 apps, but Leroy Williams, director of business development for Verizon's developer community, last week said that the store will expand quickly.
Mark Beccue, senior analyst of consumer mobility for ABI Research, says there are a couple of reasons Verizon wants in on the apps game. "One would be the struggle for ownership of subscribers... It just ties them more to the customer," Beccue says.
He adds that while revenue may be in the back of Verizon's mind, it can't be tops on the list of reasons to roll out a proprietary app store. "When you look at what iPhone and RIM are doing, they're almost doing this thing as a loss leader," he said. “I would imagine Verizon would be happy with a net-neutral outcome.”
Beccue notes Verizon's strong relationships with a number of high-profile OEMs as one reason that rollout of an apps store might go smoothly for the carrier. "BlackBerry and the RIM people have been pretty cooperative. I would guess Palm would be, because they have almost nothing to lose. And I would guess Android device manufacturers would be cooperative as well."
Beccue says that one of the most interesting things about V Cast apps is that it will leverage Verizon’s billing mechanism. “What's interesting is the billing interface. The only other app store that has a very clean line is iPhone. That's a very seamless kind of thing. Verizon supporting the billing makes this interesting,” he says.
When asked whether Verizon’s own app store is in conflict with its membership in the recently assembled Wholesale Applications Community (WAC), Beccue is dubious at best about the endeavor itself.
“I’m not holding my breath on this,” he says, adding that if anything does come of WAC, it’s going to take a few years before there’s any kind of real result. He also says that in most cases, the members of WAC are from different markets and not in competition with one another, which makes the idea of a carrier-branded app store less of a threat to the end goal of reducing fragmentation across the industry.
Beccue says he thinks there’s room for more apps stores. While cloud-based apps are certainly on the rise, there’s a much more intriguing case to be made for apps that capitalize on the capabilities of both the device and the cloud.
“The really intriguing thing is when you can integrate deeply into the OS. If you really want slick stuff that is mobile specific, then you need that integration,” he says.