Onward Mobility, a mobile app development firm from Bombay, does not sell apps online:
“We’re better off selling apps offline,” he [founder Arun Menon] says, “because Application Stores are too cluttered and our apps don’t get sufficient visibility. Especially in India, not many people buy apps through Credit Cards. People don’t need credit cards or GPRS with our existing model.”…. Given that the retail sector is still unorganized in India, the company intends to rope in individual distributors who in turn deal with individual retailers rather than targeting major retail chains.
According to another article, the apps are “transferred via USB or Bluetooth at [the] retail outlet”.
2 replies on “Offline App Store”
The issue with this model is piracy. What a retailer transferred to my mobile via bluetooth, I can redistribute it to all my friends. Unless they have some registration mechanism.
Doesn’t apply if there is a method to *install* the application via USB or Bluetooth instead of transferring the installer itself. This is pretty straightforward on Nokia phones.