Vodafone has today announced it’s bringing part of its mass-market 360 offering to Android, with the arrival of the 360 Shop – a entirely separate app store featuring tailored recommendations of apps you might like, videos, music, ring tones and more.
We don’t really see the need, to be honest, but presumably a lot of upgrading Vodafone customers are used to the 360 way of doing things – so this is for them. You’ve got to keep your upgrading customers happy.
The 360 Shop will launch “this summer” by arriving pre-installed on the Vodafone variants of the HTC Wildfire and Sony Ericsson X10 Mini Pro. Here’s the full press release, plus there’s a “webinar” explaining how to publish apps on the new system here if you’re development-minded:
VODAFONE LAUNCHES 360 SHOP FOR ANDROID
Developers able to create and distribute apps tailored to Android handsets
Tuesday 15th June, 2010. Vodafone today announced that it is to extend the reach of the Vodafone 360 services with the launch of a 360 Shop for Android. The announcement highlights Vodafone’s commitment to bringing the 360 Shop to popular, market-leading handsets and, in so doing, offering developers a highly attractive native or cross-platform proposition.
The 360 Shop on Android has been designed specifically to ensure that customers can easily search for and browse the applications most suited to their needs and interests. This is achieved through a sophisticated personalised recommendations tool and dynamically changing promotional areas such as best rated, top downloads, categories and filtered lists. Feature content promotions will be run by local market editorial experts to further showcase locally relevant apps. All paid-for content is charged to the customer through operator billing, with funds regularly transferred into the developer’s bank account, making it simple for developers to keep track of revenue.
Through the 360 Shop on Android, Vodafone is giving apps developers the ability to publish either JIL or native Android apps in the 360 Shop. Developers can also take advantage of existing Vodafone features such as clear pricing, a transparent review process and in-depth reporting.
“Developers want to know that their app will be seen by consumers, and the 360 Shop on Android has been designed to maximise opportunities for content promotion,” said Lee Epting, Director of Content Services at Vodafone Group. “Initial data is showing that up to a third of the catalogue gets exposed in a single day. This is a market-leading approach which will allow both customers and developers to get great value out of the 360 Shop.”
Tailored for the Android operating system and directly accessible from the handset home screen, the 360 Shop on Android will launch this summer on the HTC Wildfire and Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini Pro. The 360 Shop is a single destination for all digital content, integrating music, video, ringtones and apps, ensuring it will continue to serve the millions of existing Vodafone live! customers. Furthermore, the handsets will come with 360 Music services embedded and Vodafone People soon available as a download.
To date, over 8,500 apps have been published to the 360 Shop. Eight European markets range over 100 different handsets capable of accessing the Vodafone 360 services. With further handsets due to launch throughout the year with the 360 Shop pre-loaded, Vodafone 360 will continue to provide the developer community with greater access to more customers.
For further information about developing for the 360 Shop, including for Android, go to: http://developer.vodafone.com
Motorola’s latest flagship dual-core Android monster is a massive, original powerhouse, that’s a big improvement on previous MOTOBLUR mobiles – but still isn’t a total winner.
A slim and glamorous phone from Sony Ericsson, with the sharpest display around. It’s no powerhouse and the screen’s not the biggest out there, but we don’t mind. Because it’s cute.
LG’s first glasses-free 3D phone is a heavy, fat monster, with a clever 3D effect that works rather well. As a smartphone, though, it’s heavy and underwhelming.
A very shiny thing from Sony Ericsson, with a 3.7″ screen and Android 2.3.3 inside. But is it exciting enough to win fans in today’s spec-obsessed market? Can man live on one core alone?
INQ’s Android phone is an interesting “boutique” piece of hardware, packed with unique interface customisations that go far beyond the headline Facebook integration. We like it a lot.
Markg
/ June 15, 2010what is most interesting is that vodaphone have opted to use opera mobile 10 widgets for their store apps rather than regular android apps
Bristolboy
/ June 15, 2010Without knowing more about this I would say it is simply an attempt by Vodafone to get the 30% of each apps selling price which currently goes to Google.
Other networks may follow this but can’t see them ever removing the Android Market from their phones since the Android Market has many more apps and this is a selling point for the phone (the Android Market has over 70,000 apps whereas Vodafone has less than 10,000 and it isn’t even clear how many of these 8,500 are for Android handsets).
Matt S
/ June 15, 2010If there is one positive element of Apples walled garden is that there is at least a clear place to go when you want an “App”. I spent a good 15 minutes yesterday getting bamboozled by trying to help my girlfriend download the barcode scanner. She was trying to use the “App shop”, which is the name given to the Orange app store, rather than the official Android “Market”.
There is no need to have all these app stores, the official Android Market is just fine, and if the carriers want to make a little money off it then they need to create rich and engaging apps that people want so that they will buy their services.
I do not want Orange maps, Orange games, Homescreen selector, Orange mesenger, Orange photo, Orange ringtones or Game demos. If I did want them then I should be able to download them from the Market, not some carrier specific wasteland.
Not only would consumers be confused on where they can download their favourite apps from but also from the screenshot I see specific iPhone only apps. I would be pretty annoyed to see all these nice apps that I wanted to download but couldn’t have because they were iPhone/Symbian only.
Peterdk
/ June 15, 2010According to their developer site they allow native android free apps to participate in a beta. The rest of the apps are indeed some sort of widgets. They state that the other (paid??) apps can be uploaded in Q3 2010.
I am partly positive, since it means that the billing for the apps is done through the provider, and not using creditcards. A lot of non-US countries don’t use them. So more income.
bogdan
/ March 23, 2011how to uninsta vodafone 360, 360 shop, etc from my x10 mini pro? at next restart, the app from vodafone reapear on my phone