China Mobile unveils own 3G application store
China Mobile unveiled its own application download platform yesterday to strengthen market share among high-spending users ahead of rival China Unicom's introduction of Apple's iPhone next month.
Mobile Market is an open platform for all mobile software developers to write applications for China Mobile's smartphone users - to be treated as a mainland version of Apple's successful App Store. App Store, which has recorded more than 1.5 billion downloads since being launched a year ago, has been driving iPhone sales globally.
China Mobile's platform is compatible with six leading handset brands: Nokia, Samsung, LG, Dopod, Lenovo Group and Dell.
Unlike App Store, which has 20 categories of applications online, Mobile Market has six types of applications: games, mobile-telephone wallpaper, music, video and ebook downloads. The downloads vary from being free of charge to priced at 15 yuan.
China Mobile will provide a free trial to Mobile Market users, waiving all the mobile internet usage fees incurred.
To encourage software developers to contribute more to Mobile Market, China Mobile will give them 70 per cent of the revenue from each application sold.
In the face of potential competition from Unicom and iPhone next month, China Mobile needs to strengthen its 3G services by creating a new industry chain of mobile applications to defend its market share.
Apple, Nokia and Sony Ericsson have already unveiled their own mobile application download platforms to provide more value on their devices. Mobile Market is the world's first application download platform introduced by a mobile operator, according to China Mobile.
Chairman Wang Jianzhou said Mobile Market was the key to success for the firm's 3G service, which runs on the home-grown TD-SCDMA technology.
Pre-emptive play
Mobile Market was unveiled before Unicom launched the iPhone
Number of downloads from Apple's App Store since it was opened a year ago: 1.5b
