Company targets Bt100m in revenue from downloads in 2010
True Corp is gearing up for a big push in its mobile-application business this year and has targeted annual revenue of Bt100 million from this source.
The company plans to increase the number of mobile applications it is offering from 200 to more than 900. The main focus will be on Thailand's swelling number of smart-phone users, including those subscribing to other networks as well as True Move's customers.
True Corp's chief information officer for convergence Pichit Thanyodom said "extreme growth" was expected this year in mobile applications. The vital driving factor will be smart phones, of which there will be greater numbers from more brands, employing more platforms and offering more friendly interfaces to attract users to more mobile applications.
He said Thailand's mobile-application market this year was expected to more than double from last year, when it was worth a total of Bt100 million to all operators. True's strategy involves adding 700 applications to its present line-up and providing them to all smart-phone users instead of focusing only on True Move's customers.
"With our existing 200 applications and an extra 700 applications we've developed for this year, we believe we'll be able to generate Bt100 million from our mobile-application business. This will include sales of partners' applications, True's applications and mobile advertising," Pichit said.
The 700 newcomers will be applications with price tags, for three major mobile platforms - iPhone, BlackBerry and Android - as well as both individual and corporate applications.
He said revenue from True's mobile-application business was small last year, because from the 200 applications then offered, there were 1.3 million downloads, and about 80 per cent of them were free.
"This year, we'll see more aggressive moves into mobile applications for BlackBerry and Android platforms. Last year, most BlackBerry owners used only social-network-related applications, while the devices are capable of many functions. For Android, with its open-source origins, there will be a lot of phones from many manufacturers, and this will lead to an increase in the number of applications for Android phones. Extreme growth is expected for the Android platform this year, along with iPhone and BlackBerry," he said.
Last year's 1.3-million downloads of True Corp's applications covered five platforms: iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, Symbian and Windows Mobile. However, 80 per cent of them were for iPhones.
Pichit said the value of the global mobile-application market was about US$4.2 billion (Bt139 billion) last year. That involved about 3 billion downloads, and 95 per cent of these were made from Apple's app store. At the same time, the number of mobile applications spiralled upwards. For example, the offerings at Apple's app store increased from 50,000 applications to 140,000 by the end of last year. Android applications rose in 2009 from 4,900 to 20,000 and are expected to reach 80,000 by the end of this year, he said.
True Corp's strategy is not limited to the Thai market.
Pichit said the company would become a marketing arm for its application developers, distributing their mobile applications to the 11 members of the Conexus Mobile Alliance. The group is one of Asia's biggest mobile alliances, with members in Japan, South Korea, India, Hong Kong, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, Taiwan, Indonesia and Vietnam. It was formed primarily to develop and enhance international roaming and corporate-mobile services, for the convenience of its members' customers. True Corp is a member of the alliance.
The alliance boasts a combined customer base of about 240 million mobile subscribers and is committed to promoting voice, video and data roaming via its members' GSM/GPRS, WCDMA and HSDPA networks.
However, Pichit said most of True Corp's revenue from mobile applications would come from the domestic market this year, because marketing through the Conexus alliance was just starting, and not all applications would be sold abroad.
The company plans to open a True Application Centre this month, aimed at producing developers of mobile applications across all platforms. The first centre will be located at True Corp's Digital Gateway. Later, another three branches will open at universities.
"We plan to help produce more mobile-application developers in Thailand, in order to build up the number of applications that we and our foreign partners can market for them," said Pichit.
Moreover, the company will hold its annual mobile-application contest again in April. Last year, the contest helped create 80 new developers and produced 200 mobile applications for the company.
"The most popular downloaded applications include True Easy Wifi, Thai Dict, Thailand Guide and Thai Top Load, with about 100,000 downloads each," Pichit said.
