Sony reveal Playstation Suite game store for Android

I love those moments in life that make you think everything just changed. Android was huge in 2010, with growth numbers to prove it, but the app store is its Achilles' heel. Android Market is brilliant at many things, but selling apps unfortunately isn't one of them. Developers have struggled to make money on the Android platform with freemium seeming like the only way generate revenue, but only if you have a huge brand. No revenue means a lack of premium quality apps in Android Market, something that you didn't really notice when mobile was all about smartphones, but that will become much more obvious as the number of Android tablets increase.

Sony's announcement of a Playstation Suite app game store for Android means that everything just changed. There's genius behind Sony's decision to make the store "hardware-neutral", which is a pretty big step for the company when you consider that gaming has been all about hardware for years, because it means that all Android users will have access to to Playstation Suite. Sony's store will also attract major game developers in a way that Android Market hasn't been able to. Fragmentation will still be an issue with Engadget reporting that it will only be available for Gingerbread level Android, but then when isn't it on Google's platform.

I can help but feel that this is a big moment for Android. Having premium games on the platform will make a big difference to current users and help attract even more people to Android. It looks like it's time to start clearing space on a home screen for all of the different app stores I'm going to be using in 2011.

Source: Engadget

Angry Birds generating $1m per month on Android for Rovio

Rovio's Mighty Eagle Peter Vesterbacka talks about the success that his company are having with Angry Birds in a video for Google's AdMob team. One of the most amazing things that he reveals is the amount of revenue that their freemium model is generating on the Android platform, which he states will be $1m per month by the end of 2010. That's on over 5m downloads at the time of filming, but given that Angry Birds in now up to 7m downloads on Android, I'd expect that they've already surpassed that target.




Other interesting information in the video:

Retention
App retention rates are important. Angry Birds is at 80% retention. Focus on retention and not disposable apps.

Engagement
Time spent in your app is massive for advertising potential. There's no point going for the ad model if your app isn't engaging. Angry Birds users spend 65m minutes a day playing the game. That is insane!

Other revenue streams
Are there other revenue streams that you can access from your app? Rovio are launching a range of Angry Birds toys. Obviously, there's no point releasing a plush doll for your tube planner app, but alternative merchandising should be considered.

Source: Tech Crunch