Apple (AAPL) may get away with charging a premium for its devices in the developed world, but in emerging markets that sort of thing just won’t fly. In those markets, consumers are much more likely to flock to the variety of low-cost Android smartphones hitting the shelves, which is giving Google (GOOG) a big boost in its efforts to put its stamp on major markets such as China, India and Brazil. In fact, Android’s edge in emerging markets has gotten so strong that one software platform executive thinks it will be a dominant force for years to come.
“Android is going to own over 75 percent of smartphone sales in emerging markets,” Joonas Hjelt, the CEO of Finnish technology startup Blaast, said this week.
And Hjelt is putting his money where his mouth is: Reuters says that Blaast has “opened an Android application store hoping to tap into booming demand for affordable smartphones in Indonesia and other emerging markets.” To achieve this, the company “has built a platform to distribute apps to mid-range cellphones, enabling carriers to sell more data packages bundled with free access to applications.”
If Blaast’s big bet on Android in emerging markets is correct, then it will mean that Google has really fulfilled its goal to bring the mobile web to all corners of the world (while also hooking users everywhere into its ad revenue-generating services, of course).
