Nokia's Ovi Store posts unprecedented local, global growth

MANILA, Philippines - Nokia, the Finnish mobile phone giant, continues to reach its goals in the applications game, getting over one million monthly downloads on its Ovi Store from Philippine users alone. 

According to Benoit Nalin, general manager of Nokia Philippines, the number of daily downloads has increased since September 2010 to over one million last Dec. 31, posting an impressive growth of 75 percent in just three months. 

This latest achievement could be attributed to the Ovi Store’s updated and friendlier feel as well as providing more choices for applications, themes and games for download-loving Pinoys.

These apps were also made easily available for Nokia Symbian smartphone users, which gave Ovi Store a wider edge among this increasing demographic of mobile phone users.   

“This milestone once again reflects Nokia’s unwavering success in bringing more personalization options for mobile users. With this feat achieved by Nokia, it is safe to say that 2010 indeed was the year of applications,” Nalin said.

“The success that Ovi Store reached here in the Philippines also reflects our success worldwide, which once again cements Nokia’s reputation as the world’s most user-friendly, innovative and accessible mobile brand. This success indeed motivates Nokia to bring even more exciting applications and games for Pinoys and consumers all around the world,” he added.

Apart from reaching download success in the country, Nokia’s Ovi Store globally generates 3.5 million downloads per day. Just recently, Ovi Store was reported to be leading in China, where 65.2 percent of the population claimed Ovi was their preferred download channel.

This feat was complemented by a continuous surge in software developer support with over 400,000 new developers joining Forum Nokia in the past 12 months, and 92 developers topping one million downloads for their apps.

The success reached by the Ovi Store was fueled by new apps and games from a growing number of partners and complemented by the more than 250,000 new consumers signing up for Ovi every day. 

Ovi users in Phl

In the Philippines alone, there are a little over 400,000 active Ovi users and the availability of social networking applications, games and themes, particularly those that are locally produced, has influenced the surge of downloads on the Ovi Store.

Ovi apps were downloaded mostly from some of Nokia’s top Symbian devices like the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, Nokia N8, Nokia 5530 XpressMusic, Nokia E63 and Nokia E71 smartphones, and top S40 devices like the Nokia C3-00, Nokia X3-02, Nokia 5130, Nokia 2700c classic, and Nokia 6300. 

The Nokia C3, for instance, posted a total of 347,000 downloads from the Ovi Store last year, while the just released Nokia N8 device recorded 276,000 in Ovi Store downloads.

Popular applications on Ovi Store in the Philippines for Symbian devices were:

• Opera Mobile Browser, a fast Web browser that allows users to access full Internet on their mobile phone and features tabbed browsing, content download, skinning, and synchronizing bookmarks;

• Skype, which allows users to call or text for free to families or friends abroad;

• World Tong-its Tour, the mobile version of the popular local card game;

• Facebook Chat, an application that allows users to chat with their Facebook friends on their mobile; and

• Hangman, an entertaining word puzzle game.

For S40 devices like the Nokia C3 and Nokia X3-02, top apps were:

• Facebook Chat; High Speed 3D, which lets users enjoy an action-packed racing game;

• Galaga, the popular long-running arcade hit;

• Double Trap, an exciting game of clay disk shooting wherein shooter has to hit a clay disk flung away from him at high speed; and

• Pacman, the No. 1 arcade hit of all time which boasts of slick new graphics, scrolling mazes and a lot more.

Even the “Ovi Theme-spirations” promotion featuring original phone themes designed by Filipinos, attracted impressive download numbers from local and foreign consumers, generating almost two million downloads since they were posted on Ovi Store last Dec. 21.

The Ovi Store is also gaining significant momentum among software developers. Some of the top local publishers are Y&R Philippines, which published the Ovi Theme-spirations phone themes, among others; MRM Studios, publisher of top-quality phone themes, ringtones, karaoke music and other multimedia content, and Automated Solutions Enablers Inc., developer of the World Tong-its Tour and Tong-its Extreme card games, popular not only in the Philippines but also in other Southeast Asian countries like Vietnam, Thailand and Malaysia.

“We anticipate our progress will continue as we introduce our new line-up of devices in the coming months. Expect more download-worthy applications that will be offered for free to mobile users,” Nalin said.