It is very interesting to see the results of the latest Nomura research on the App-ecosystems.
After eight years, it seems that people have all the apps they need already. Small developers are having a hard time, but even the biggest ones are seeing a heavy decline in the number of downloads, driven by a natural saturation of the market.
This has several implications.
For Apple and google, this trend is a big menace because it weakens their strategic position in the market place against future platforms and against each other. When the iOS and Goole Play ecosystems become essentially the same with the same content, differentiation weakens. This is specially worrying for Apple, because of their higher price point and lower global market share. The new Apple App Store policies, granting 85% of revenues to developers vs. 70% before is a clear signal on that.
For giants like Facebook, it is a direct consequence of how huge and successful these applications have become. At the same time, they will face the scrutiny of Wall Street, which seem to have reduced their attention span to growth and growth only. Share price my suffer. Place your bets.
Finally, this facts stand in stark contrast with the insistent message from the EU commission a couple of years ago trying to convince European entrepreneurs to develop Apps as if that would save the EU from its economic difficulties. Again, it proves that politicians have a hard time predicting technology trends and should let the market decide for itself which way to go.
Read the ReCode story here.