Mobile Applications : ABI Research expects application downloads to reach five billion by 2014. That is an increase from an estimated 2.3 billion applications downloaded in 2009. The growing adoption of smartphones which saw sales rise 20% in 2009, as well as the proliferation of application stores, are the major drivers for this expansive surge. ABI Research expects revenue from mobile app sales to decline by 2013, as competition will lead to downward pressure on application prices, and a greater proportion of “must-have” applications will begin to face competition from free or advertising-supported substitutes. This has already happen, with the launch of Google’s free turn-by-turn navigation service.
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