Samsung announced that it will give away cash prizes of $10,000 if their apps become one of the top 100 most downloaded apps on its Tizen mobile platform.
Altogether, Samsung will be handing out a total of $1 million in cash prizes from February through September of next year through the Tizen Mobile App Incentive Program. This gives developers a significant incentive to port their Android or iOS apps over to the Tizen platform if they have not already done so.
Samsung is targeting emerging markets to increase adoption of the Tizen platform. Tizen is an open-source operating system based on Linux that Samsung includes in many of its connected devices like TVs and wearables. However, it’s seen very little adoption in the smartphone market outside of India. Samsung said in a statement that the Tizen platform will play an increasingly large role in the cheaper handsets that it builds for emerging markets. Samsung launched the Z2 phone back in August, a $68 handset that became the first 4G smartphone model running the Tizen platform. The company’s high-end flagship handsets continue to run the Android platform.
Samsung needs to get more developers building apps for the platform to make the Tizen platform more enticing for consumers. The new cash prizes program comes just a month after Samsung launched the Tizen App Challenge, a reward program offering cash prizes to game developers that port their Android and iOS apps over to Tizen.
The challenge of marketing an app effectively has made app-install ads — an ad unit that directs users to download a mobile app — an essential tool for developers seeking to stand out in the Google Play and Apple app stores. This is why it’s not surprising that more marketers are using paid channels to drive downloads than ever before. In fact, over 80% of respondents in a survey of the top 100 grossing mobile app developers noted they plan on increasing their spend on app-install ads in 2015.
By Shruti
