Apple: App Store Rings In 2015 With New Records

Apple® today announced that the first week of January set a new record for
billings from the App Store℠ with customers around the world spending nearly
half a billion dollars on apps and in-app purchases, and New Year's Day 2015
marked the single biggest day ever in App Store sales history. These
milestones follow a record-breaking 2014, in which billings rose 50 percent
and apps generated over $10 billion in revenue for developers. To date, App
Store developers have earned a cumulative $25 billion from the sale of apps
and games. The introduction of iOS 8, the most significant iOS update ever,
gave developers the ability to create amazing new apps and offers innovative
features which proved wildly popular with App Store customers around the
world.

“This year is off to a tremendous start after a record-breaking year for the
App Store and our developer community,” said Eddy Cue, Apple's senior vice
president of Internet Software and Services. “We're so proud of the creativity
and innovation developers bring to the apps they create for iOS users and that
the developer community has now earned over $25 billion.”

During the holiday season App Store customers helped make history with their
support of Apps for (RED), a special initiative on the store with exclusive
content where all proceeds went to the Global Fund to fight AIDS. Apple
donated a record-shattering $20 million this quarter, and since partnering
with (RED) has donated over $100 million.

Developers of all sizes, across the App Store's 24 categories, create
incredible apps for iOS, and an especially inspired segment is the newest
generation of independent game creators, including the UK's ustwo, maker of
the fantastic game Monument Valley; Australia's Hipster Whale, creator of the
clever and intuitive game Crossy Road; and US developer Sirvo, inventor of
Threes!, a puzzle game that was named the App Store's Game of the Year on
iPhone®.

“We could never have dreamed of this level of success, with Crossy Road only
being available on the App Store for the last six weeks of the year,” said
Matthew Hall, co-founder of Hipster Whale. “In a couple of months we were able
to create a simple, fun game that was featured on the App Store and climbed to
the top of the App Store charts around the world—it's amazing.”

Developer innovation on the App Store in 2014 was fueled by iOS 8 featuring
Swift, a powerful new programming language that makes it even easier for
developers to create great apps, as well as the introduction of robust
frameworks HealthKit and HomeKit. HealthKit lets health and fitness developers
share data with the Health app while HomeKit is a framework allowing
developers to create software that discovers, configures, communicates with
and controls devices for home automation. iOS 8 also introduced developers to
Metal, a graphics technology created to maximize the performance of the A7 and
A8 chips, which is being embraced by major game developers around the world.

In 2014, the App Store also unveiled new features for developers including app
previews and app bundles, TestFlight for beta testing pre-release apps, an
expanded Kids Category to showcase apps specifically made for children under
12, China UnionPay as a payment option for customers in China and Apple Pay™,
making secure purchases even easier.

Since its October release, Apple Pay has been a favorite of customers,
merchants and app developers. More banks and credit unions continue to add
support for Apple Pay, now representing about 90 percent of credit card
purchase volume in the US. Leading merchants including Bloomingdale's, Disney
Store, Duane Reade and Walgreens are letting their customers enjoy the ease of
use, security and privacy of Apple Pay. Some of the most popular apps
including HotelTonight, OpenTable, Target and Ticketmaster are also enjoying
the convenience and privacy of Apple Pay, making it even easier for users to
make secure purchases.

“The response we've seen from HotelTonight customers since the introduction of
Apple Pay has been fantastic,” said Sam Shank, CEO, HotelTonight. “Our current
customer base is enjoying the convenience of Apple Pay and we're continuing to
see a growing number of new customers because of Apple Pay's easy and secure
approach to payments.”

Apple ignited the app revolution with the launch of the App Store in 2008, and
since then, an entire industry has been built around app design and
development. In just six years, the iOS ecosystem has helped create 627,000
jobs in the US alone.* The App Store offers more than 1.4 million apps for
iPhone, iPad® and iPod touch® users in 155 countries around the world, with
more than 725,000 of these apps made for iPad. App Store customers can choose
from an incredible range of apps in 24 categories, including games, social
networking, photo & video, sports, health & fitness, travel, kids and many
more.