Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)’s App Store wanted to celebrate a huge milestone, so they offered a huge prize for the lucky person who would download the 50th billionth iOS application from the App Store. They even turned it into a race.
On Thursday morning, the Cupertino-based company announced this significant milestone and named the winner of the race: Brandon Ashmore of Mentor, Ohio. The app he downloaded was ‘Say the Same Thing’ by Space Inch and his prize was a $10,000 App Store gift card.
On Wednesday, the threshold was met before 2:00 pm Pacific Standard Time when the website’s counter turned over the 50 billionth mark. The App Store sent a tweet shortly after acknowledging that someone hit the mark. Fifty of those who downloaded apps right after Ashmore will each receive a $500 App Store gift card.
Eddy Cue, senior vice president of Internet Software and Services, said, ““Apple would like to thank our incredible customers and developers for topping 50 billion apps downloaded. The App Store completely transformed how people use their mobile devices and created a thriving app ecosystem that has paid out over nine billion dollars to developers. We’re absolutely floored to cross this milestone in less than five years.”
Naturally, this puts Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) a step ahead of their rival. Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) recently announced their 48th billion app mark at the I/O Conference.
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) added that customers have been downloading over 800 apps per second at the rate of over 2 billion apps per month. The App Store first launched in the summer of 2008 with 500 apps. Interestingly enough, it took just 14 months for the App Store to go from 25 billion downloads to 50 billion downloads.
If this report indicates anything, it indicates that Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) still reigns supreme. Consumers love their products and their apps. Even with competition from the likes of Android, there is still much room left for Apple. Even more importantly, consumers still prefer Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL).
