APPLE HAS stepped up its efforts to tackle a problem for both users and developers of the 550,000 apps available for iPhone and iPad that will be familiar to customers of satellite television: too much choice.
The California-based technology company has acquired Chomp, a search engine start-up launched in 2010 to help people discover new and interesting applications, or apps.
“Discovering apps in a catalogue of more than 500,000 apps – and growing – is a challenge for many consumers,” said Thomas Husson, mobile analyst at Forrester Research. “Apple was until now not doing a good job at this.”
The move comes as Apple nears 25 billion downloads of apps on its iOS platform, up from 18 billion in October, with Google’s rival Android catching up fast with about a billion a month.
Apps are seen as vital in consumers’ smartphone purchasing decisions.
Benedict Evans of Enders Analysis said that Apple needed to maintain its position as the most lucrative platform for developers to ensure the best new apps appear on the iPhone first.
Chomp groups apps by theme _ such as “live sports” – and also provides personalised recommendations. Its algorithm learns what apps do, rather than just using their names, to allow easier browsing.
Apple already has its own personalisation technology, Genius, but the acquisition of Chomp has been seen as an admission that it needed improvement.
The start-up’s team of professors and PhDs from Berkeley, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Princeton universities have already begun work at Apple after what Bloomberg reported was a $50 million acquisition. – (Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2012)
