In this episode of the Naavik Gaming podcast, host Niko Vuori interviews Álvaro Pinto, co-founder and COO of Aptoide, an independent app store with over 430 million users and 10 billion downloads.
They discuss the evolution of app distribution, the concept of decentralization, and how Aptoide has grown and adapted over the years. Álvaro shares insights into the company's revenue model, user demographics, and the impact of blockchain technology through their AppCoins initiative.
The conversation highlights the challenges and opportunities in the app distribution landscape, especially in light of regulatory changes in Europe and Japan, and the push for alternative solutions to the dominant app store duopoly of Apple and Google.

We’d also like to thank Overwolf for making this episode possible! Whether you're a gamer, creator, or game studio, Overwolf is the ultimate destination for integrating UGC in games! You can check out all Overwolf has to offer at https://www.overwolf.com/.
This transcript is machine-generated, and we apologize for any errors.
Niko: Hello and welcome to the Naavik Gaming Podcast. I'm your host, Niko Vuori. In today's episode, we are diving into the world of alternative app distribution with a focus on Aptoide, one of the largest independent app stores globally.
They've got over 430 million users. They've got a library of 1 million apps and a cumulative 10 billion downloads. And you probably haven't heard of them, but you are going to hear about them today. Aptoide is interesting because it offers a unique platform, both for developers and for users who are seeking alternatives to, of course, the mainstream duopoly of app stores, Apple and Google.
And this is of course, extremely topical, which is why we wanted to have, this episode because it's hot off the heels of the Europe's digital markets act, which promises to break up the duopoly of Apple and Google, not just in Europe, likely globally as well. It's going to have repercussions. So to talk about these alternative app stores is Alvaro Pinto.
He's the co founder and chief operating officer at Aptoide. He has extensive experience in these types of operations and business development, and he has been one of the instrumental driving forces of Aptoide's growth and global expansion. And today, getting to that eye popping 10 billion download number, which kind of blows my mind.
So, Alvaro, welcome to the pod. Great to have you here.
Alvaro: Oh, likewise, Niko. Thank you for the invitation. It's a pleasure to be here with you today.
Wonderful. Well, the pleasure is all mine. So, this is an amazing story. I will confess I hadn't heard one of those people who hadn't heard about Aptoide in advance of this episode.
And when I started digging into the numbers and some of the metrics that you guys have been posting since I think you found it in 2011, it's kind of mind blowing. The numbers are huge, and yet you're kind of flying under the radar. Maybe not so for longer, if you're going to be on the Naavik podcast, of course, we're going to blow everything up here.
But let's, let's talk about your background first, and then we're going to dive into Aptoid. What's your background? How did you come to start and found Aptoid in 2011? And, what's your journey been over the last decade plus?
Alvaro: Sure, sure. So starting in the early days, but first I study, I've studied law.
And then, but I, since the early days, I love technology, and I start programming with the first computers, and then I was able to, while I was at Ike's school, I launched a built in bot service with a friend. So we, we managed that for two, three years. And actually, while I was studying in law school here in Lisbon, Portugal. I've, I spent one year developing a game and I launched my own game.
It was a Formula 1 game team manager. It was something inspired in the game back in the days of. There was this computer quite popular in Europe called Sinclair ZX Spectrum. And, and so, yeah, so, I used to play a lot with my friends, this, this game. And, um, a few years later I decided to develop the same game for, and launch it for, For the Commodore Amiga, and I launched it for Commodore Amiga.
I sold a few copies of it, but it was fun. And I spent many, many nights playing with friends. And because I study law, I started my career working actually for the Portuguese government bridging technology. And law, and trying to bring, okay, technology and digital solutions for, well, all these different services in, in, in, mainly in the justice department.
So I spent a few years there. And then I decided in the early days of the internet to launch my own company with a friend. And so we started the company back in 1998 to develop web portals, e-commerce solutions. And we did a few projects in Portugal and we launched a big e-commerce platforms for like the top the air company year or a couple of the local TVs. And it was a great experience. Then we sold the company to a big retail store because we were developing a gamification solution for the cast for their, their, their employees. And they wanted to, to have the, the technology and continue to develop and they acquired the company because, because of that technology.
So it was after that project that I was invited by Paolo, the other co-founder and CEO of the company to join Aptoide. And this was in the early days of the smartphones. So. Back in 2007, it was launched iPhone, then in 2008, it was the Android, the first Android device. And actually the project started back in 2009.
It was a summer internship and the idea was simple behind it. Okay, there's this new platform, Android, It makes sense to have a distribution solution for apps and games. So, let's do something that is similar to what you can find in Linux distributions. Because we have some background on open source, and we decided to, okay, it makes sense to have a distribution like apt get, which comes from Debian.
The distributions and it's a way for you to have different repositories and be able to access them and install the packages in your computer. So it's a decentralized solution for an app store distribution solution, which is quite different from what you have in Google on apples, apple solution. And it was that the first concept.
And on top of that, we wanted to make sure that anyone could have it. A store. It's not single store. It's multiple stores like you have in the repositories of Linux. So the idea was simple. It's okay, let's give the freedom for people to have their own store. You are a game developer, you can have your own store.
You want to distribute some apps, you can do it. So that was the initial concept of Aptoide.
Niko: So, yeah, very early insight. It seems like you guys had into this idea. Of course, decentralization these days is very hot, hot, hot, because of, you know, web three and crypto and, decentralization is the, is the name of the game, but back in those days, that wasn't necessarily so obvious.
And it wasn't, I don't think, I mean, I was building early mobile as well, and I don't recall there being a massive backlash to Apple and Google having essentially. You know, the, the gatekeeper role, it was just exciting to be able to build apps and, you know, as a developer myself, it was thrilling to put it there and then have that big audience.
Right. And that's the thing that they of course promise, you know, I'm an iPhone user and hence I have never looked at alternative app stores for, for Android. And hence I haven't heard of Aptoide. So long winded intro there to, to the question, why did you have this insight? Why did you think it was? Needed your solution was needed this decentralized solution that allowed any developer, whether it be game developer or app developer to put something up there and then have essentially free access to consumers, but without the big distribution advantage, I'm presuming in those early days, at least that would have come with Apple and Google.
If you'd gone and built there.
Alvaro: Yeah, sure. It was the early days and what we realized back then, it was that, okay, this is going to be huge for sure. It's why everybody will have one of these devices, be it an Android or iOS, but Android definitely will grow. And this means that this will be a huge market.
And we strongly believe that to have an open solution for distribution makes full sense. Again, because our background on open source, we, we love the idea of having something that, and, and actually the, the first versions we launched were open source, so everything was open source, not only the platform itself, but also the, the native app.
So the idea is, okay, anyone can pick it up and even improve it if they want, and then pick this. So this gives much more freedom and more than that. It gives space to innovation, which is actually something we, we feel it's still, still lacking in this market. So in the distribution of, of, of mobile apps. So we thought, okay, this can be something that's democratizes the distribution of games and apps.
And so it's accessible to anyone and it makes full sense in this market that will. Boom in the coming years.
Niko: So now we're about a decade and a half later, into your life. Obviously you've had a lot of success and have grown, I'm presuming in ways that you couldn't even imagine back in those days, how has your original vision and the product, evolved over this decade and a half since you first got going?
Alvaro: I think, looking back, so we, we… What, what I think was always a priority for us and, was to, to build something exciting that we feel like, Oh, this is exciting. This is innovative. So let's bring new trends, new technologies to the table. And we did several things along the way. So of course, first we launched this open source store, which was different from the rest of the world and the, the, we, this distribution, that's what was decentralized, but then, you know, Just to give you a few examples, okay, with the social media and social networks, we launched, for example, a timeline, , back in the days for people to follow their friends and see, okay, what are the trends?
What, what are my friends playing? So something that was similar to social media and social networks. And we thought, okay, okay. This, this makes sense in this context, or for example, we, we embraced blockchain in the early days and we launched our own token and tried to solve several of the problems we were facing in, in the distribution of, of games and apps.
So just to give you examples nowadays, for example, of course we are focused on AI, so we always try to bring innovation to this market and I think this is a big differentiator, I would say. Compared with other platforms are being Goldman's platforms.
Niko: Yeah, we're gonna talk about your numbers in a second because they are huge and really impressive.
I'm curious, where do your users come from? Do they come with a certain philosophy in mind? They're open source enthusiasts or their decentralization enthusiasts or blockchain enthusiasts these days? Obviously, back in those early days, that wouldn't have been a thing or is it just any. You know, it's just the average person.
They're just looking for apps and they stumble upon Aptoid. And they're like, Oh, this is cool. There's a whole bunch of stuff here. There's a million apps I can, I can access. Where do your users come from? How has that changed over time over the decade and a half you've been around?
Alvaro: Yeah, sure. So we, in the early days, the most of our users were coming from actually from some countries in Europe, Europe, for example, Spain was our, in the early days was our top market.
Then you shift a little bit to let them. And then it started to become global. And so, for example, in 2015, 2016, we, we opened two offices in Asia because we were seeing a boom of users in Southeast Asia, and we decided to open an office there. There, we saw also the opportunity, okay, to partner with the Chinese companies, we open another office there.
So it's expanded to the rest of the world. And nowadays, of course, the most important markets for us are US and Europe. And because there's two different audiences, we see users and paying users or gamers that are paying. And we mostly The users we are paying in our platform are gamers and, and most of these users are based mostly U.
S. And Europe, the in terms of the rest of the users that get games and also other apps from, from app guide, they are quite spread, in different geos across the, across the block.
Niko: Yeah, I mean, the numbers at the start, I rattled off almost a half a billion users, which, by the way, I don't know how you measure that.
Is it half a billion lifetime users or monthly actives or? Just out of curiosity, how do you measure that?
Alvaro: Yeah, this is the, the yearly number of users combined and we have a platform that aggregates different distribution channels. I can explain, I'll give you more details on that, but, so this is the yearly numbers in, in that platform.
Niko: Got it. So, yeah, so about a half a billion users a year, which is huge. And then 10 billion downloads. What have you guys done to help drive this? You mentioned, it sounds like early on it was kind of organic and that kind of Changed by geo, presumably because of adoption rates of smartphones and things like that in the early days.
And it's always good to be early, not too early, but you know, it's good to be early, over the years then what have you been doing in order to drive those numbers to get to that near nearly half a billion a year and 10 billion downloads.
Alvaro: So different things when, in the early days, as you were saying, it was more, mostly organic and people were excited about, okay, let's have my own store or, for example, we had.
Several apps and games that were not available, in Google Play, for example, because, because of Google's policies, they were not there. It was not, it was not spam, it was not malicious apps or games, but were, In the gray area for them, and they were not allowed to be with it. So, we supported those, for example, that was one of the drivers of our growth.
So we were able to grow in the early days because of those, those apps. Then we shift and, the shift happened. Between 2007-2008, 2018 and 2019 because we launched our own token, we start to be more focused on IEPs in purchases monetization through, through that. And so we launched our own solution for IEPs in the early days, backed in, in in blockchain technology in our token.
And we started to be more and more focused on gaming. And nowadays, we are much more focused on gaming than in other categories of apps. And what we saw is that, okay, we, with the token and with our own wallet, we can offer, , incentives to users. We can give them More bonus, more for them to spend in their games and we started to nurture that and actually that's what's been been growing since then in the platform and that's our our growth engine for for the last few years.
So we are really focused on gamers. And especially paying users people that spend Time and spend money in games and that's our our core audience and where we've been growing in the in the last years
Niko: Perfect. There's a lot to unpack there because I was also web three developer for for a number of years.
And, you know, distribution, of course, especially on the mobile platforms was and still is a big problem. You know, Apple's rules, Google's rules. They're softening up a little bit, but I can very easily imagine as a developer, I would it. Absolutely would have loved half a billion if I finally had known a half a billion users with sounds like rules that are much more open.
And, you know, any developer can put up a store there. So sounds like that's what you've been leaning into. Is it fair to say that Web three and and that the kind of crypto slash blockchain movement has been a big driver of that? Or is that coincidental that it happened at the same time?
Alvaro: Yeah, it was. It was for a while. Nowadays it has a role but not so strong and so relevant as it was back in 2018, 2019. Because we launched our token in 2018 and AppCoins and the idea behind it was also to be able to have a solution for in app purchases and payments in, in games and apps. And based on blockchain technology, again, decentralized and accessible to anyone and anyone could develop the technology to integrate.
App coins in the game in a very straightforward way. And, but open meaning that, okay, it's not an SDK that is defined by us and the rules are set by us. No, it's something that is open and people can define their own model based on app coins. And this was, was something we thought this will open the markets.
And on top of that, we also thought there was some issues, for example, in promoting games, and we launched also use the token to try to have a new offer for user acquisition and Based on the attention of the users This was popular in some platforms and we also follow that movement Okay Let's have something that is based on the time the people spend Playing and they are rewarded by that and we launched these two concepts back in 2018 We worked on the on the project for around three years But actually, in the middle of the way, we dropped it and we dropped it because we understood that although the technology made full sense on paper, was some constraints in terms of what was available for us to be able to scale and have something that's a cost wise, because we are talking about many times about micropayments that it doesn't cost a fortune to the user.
And it's, it's scalable in a way that we have. Thousands and thousands of transactions on a, in a minute, for example. And, and so we were unable to accomplish that with the technology that was available at the time and when the one we tried to, to develop, but even trying to partnership with other third party companies and projects.
And so we somehow dropped it. And nowadays, we have our wallet, our IP, but we are based in more traditional ways of payment and processing payments.
Niko: Well, I have a whole line of questions on AppCoin later on. So we'll, we'll, we'll talk about it when we get there, but yeah, I'm really curious. To hear, to hear more about how it works and what it offers for developers.
I know you've touched on some of that already, but I want to get kind of deeper into it, but in the meantime, I want to talk a little bit about what's your revenue model the, and whatever you're able to share, I would love to hear about kind of top line numbers and anything that you're able to share.
I understand. Of course, if you—
Alvaro: Sure. And, and so in, in the early days of the company, we, our, our revenue stream was mostly coming from advertising. And we shift this back in 2016-2017, and we start to develop our billing solution for in app purchases. And currently that's the main source of revenue for the company.
It's in app purchases. And so we developed our own, own solution for payments. Covering payments across the globe. So of course the, the more standard ones, but also local payments. And so we provide a wallet that is very easy to use and very convenient to any user across the globe and get, can get, the items that are in app, items.
And that also have a gamification engine to, to provide them more bonus and more credits for them to use in games and apps. So that's the main source of revenue nowadays.
Niko: Okay. And are you able to share anything about the kind of the magnitude of any numbers, specific numbers? Our audience is very, likes data as do I.
So whatever you can share, I'd love to hear about that. And then the second piece, second piece there, which is tied is, is it sounds like the model is very similar to the actual, you know, to Apple and Google. You're taking a percentage cut of each transaction that happens. And of course, you provide the Payment infrastructure, which, you know, means that they have, you know, developers and users have a very easy time of it.
What is your percentage cut and has that changed over time? What is the developer economic model look like versus the economic model?
Alvaro: Sure. So we first on the number. So last. Last year we transacted a total of around 87 million U. S dollars in in our platform and so the in the early days the revenue share model was more beneficial to developers was 81 19 To, to, to, to us and, uh, comparing of course, with the 70, 30 and, and then we, we shift to like two years ago to 75, 25, so be on, then we, we have some also, for example, we provide a solution for.
For developers to do direct, direct distribution, direct to consumer. And, in this model, it's, it's different. The revenue share is 90 to the developer and 10 to us because we believe with the opening of the market, with the MA, et cetera, and we'll probably talk about this, but we believe that direct to consumer is something that is already happening, but it will grow considerably in the coming years.
And so we want to provide a convenient solution for developers because they integrate our SDK and they're able to distribute not only on, on Aptoide, also on other channels that are connected with us. Because. Currently, we cover almost 20 different channels that are linked to our platform. And so the developer does one integration and it distributes across all these channels, but also he can, for example, do his own acquisition or promote his game in his own website and use our direct to consumer solution.
With the same build of the game, so this is, it's more convenient, it's easy to use and we believe it adds value to for the developer. So one single integration covers multiple, multiple channels.
Niko: I mentioned the start you have 1, 000, 000 apps. And if you have any updated numbers, happy to hear about them. I'm presuming, but you correct me if I'm wrong here, that the distribution of the revenue is probably that a power law distribution where a small number of your games sounds like mostly games, are generating the vast majority of that revenue, then there's kind of a longer tail that tapers off curious to hear if that, that assumption is correct.
And what kinds of games are driving. The lion's share of the revenue, uh, on your platform.
Alvaro: Sure. Yeah. Yeah. It's too, so it's similar to what you, you get in other platforms, as we all know, it's the same with Google and Apple and all other. , and typically the games that, revenue wise are more relevant for, to us, uh, typically meet core games and strategy, RPGs, and all these games that have these players gamers playing for a long time and investing a lot in the games.
That's the kind of, audience that we have. And that's in the, in terms of monetization is the most appealing and the most interesting one and the one we've been trying to nurture also in terms of what we are offering to them.
Niko: That's a perfect segue to my next question, which is what are you offering developers?
It sounds like when you made that shift towards more of the gaming side of things, you know, a number of years ago, you made a very conscious choice. It seems that, Hey, we're going to be nurturing this gamer, a game developer and gamer ecosystem. I'm sure not at the expense of other developers. I'm sure you still support them, but it sounds like most of the tools you've been building have been for game developers.
What exactly are you providing these developers in terms of, you know, revenue generation, abilities, visibility, distribution, reach, obviously. Talked quite a bit about the decentralized nature where, you know, it's not just on Aptoide, but it's, you know, it's not a walled garden. You can go and go direct to consumer as well.
What are you offering developers that is unique to you and not available to other developers on Google Play or, or iOS?
Alvaro: One thing that we really realized, a few years ago was that, okay, it's a big challenge to, to propose to developers, to game developers, a platform where when, even though we, we reached.
Very respectable numbers. It's still far, far away from Google and Apple. And, , so , it's really difficult to, for you to convince the developer, okay, you should integrate not only our Aptoide, but also other alternative stars because, them individually, each of them represents a fraction of what they get in terms of users, monetization.
In google play or in apple app store. So we came up with this solution We called it back in the days catapult and we launched this platform where it's a like a one stop shop where developers sign up Submit their games they do one integration and then they can decide where to distribute and so what we are trying here With this platform is to connect.
You to connect between, our, the developer and multiple, these multiple channels in a way that, well, they have access to a dashboard where they can see distribution per channel in a single dashboard, they can see the monetization across these different channels in a single dashboard. And that's one of the things we developed in the last few years.
That's it. It's, it's different from what you get in, in other, in other platforms. So first this, this, one stop shop, then of course we provide multiple services direct to consumer is just an example of something we came up recently. And so we added also in terms of service to, to for developers to, to have an easier life in distribution in alternative stars and, in terms of promoting these games, we work not only in the promotion of an Aptoide, but also in all these different channels.
So we are connected with the different stars, for example, from Xiaomi, Oppo, APK pure, one star we distribute to all these channels. And we, when we launch the game, we make sure that our plan, for promoting the game, not only covers Aptoide, but also these multiple channels, and this is. Quite convenient because okay to go one after one for developers to reach all these channels and to okay engage with them Do their integration talk with the different people across different channels to promote the game.
It's a heavy load. So this means that with this platform, it's very easy for them. We take care of that part. And so the distribution across the multiple channels and the promotion becomes quite straightforward for for the developers.
Niko: Okay, so yeah, because distribution, of course, is one of those big, big, big issues that all developers face.
You can't just say if you build it, they will come. You need to do the hard lifting on the distribution side. The other flip side of this is also, I think we've mentioned app coins a few times now, and you're very early to blockchain technology. You know, you predate the big crypto boom, I think you mentioned 2017, 2018. Yeah, so, so that's pretty early and that's definitely that was pretty In the middle of that crypto winter, and we hadn't yet gotten to that next crypto phase of wild enthusiasm, another round of tulips, tulip mania, so tell me a little bit about what, what motivated you to go down this path?
What, what did you see that many others didn't see about blockchain technologies? At that early stage, because it was still very raw. I got into crypto in 2016. So I remember very much how hard it was and wallets were a nightmare and scams were, you know, rife. Everything was just it was the Wild West and to a certain degree still is.
But then it really was the Wild West. What made you think that this is something developers would embrace? What made you think that this is something that they would trust, uh, or even understand at that point in time, when it was really that early and the word crypto was used mostly as a derogatory term, at least in that that time frame?
Alvaro: Well, we, we were, to be honest, There was, okay, nobody was sure about, okay, what is, what's the future of this? Is this going to resonate with, with developers or even users? We really don't know what we know is that the concept behind it, it's, it's a new trend and the concept behind it makes full sense to us.
And, we strongly believe that in a market that as two big players. Big players. If you want to change things, you need to come up with something that is innovative and, of course disrupts the market. And blockchain was about disruption. So, it made full sense to us, to try to, to bring the, something that, would make the, the payments in, in the app, economy.
Different from what was proposed by these big players and then the distribution and acquisition different from completely different and with something that eventually they could follow if they see, okay, this is definitely the future of distribution. But as you know, it's really. It's the innovators dilemma, and it means that they will take time.
So let's take the opportunity and be pioneers on this. That was what we felt at the time. But of course, as all of the pioneers on the blockchain, nobody really knew if this would work or not. And we strongly believe that it will. Today it's still, although we dropped the project, somehow, we still believe in it.
And we are open to, to explore new ideas based on blockchain. As soon as we feel that the technology is there, we have the means to, to do it, and to make something that can scale, based on that concept.
Niko: Yeah, yeah. What kinds of decisions, technology decisions did you make around that time around up coins?
You know, is it a theory and based the earthy twenties? Or is it, um, your own proprietary technology yet? Tell me a little bit more about the kind of under the hood in the weeds, technical stuff that you guys looked at and chose.
Alvaro: Yeah, it was a, we follow a more, more conservative path because we went to Ethereum, network and our C20 tokens.
And because we knew, okay, we have these big challenges of trying to disrupt the distribution. So that's. Enough for us to think about and to spend our time and our effort and our teams, we decided, okay, let's follow what is the trend here. And even because we saw that, okay, in terms of technical solutions, there's more options here.
So let's follow this because this is still emerging. We are still not sure that this is solid ground. So let's make sure that we follow the majority of the projects that are appearing, showing up. So to make sure that we benefit from all the improvements this will get earlier probably than other platforms or other solutions.
That was our, our, our path and the decision we made back in the days.
Niko: And what's next for AppCoins then, where are you taking it? If anywhere?
Alvaro: I think so we, what we see today is quite interesting because we've been in the market for almost 15 years. The company started back, I didn't, didn't explain this, but the company, the project was.
Started in 2009, but the company actually started back in 2011. And that's when we incorporated Aptoide and, but it's interesting to, to see how the market evolved and the, okay, it was a long journey and a tough one for sure, because it's not easy in this market and we, the big competitors that, that are in place.
So, and to, to give you an example, back in the days in the early days, like 20 12, 12 13, we, we used to go to Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. It was one of the biggest events for, for mobile. And we used to have this dinner with the other stores, the alternative stores at the time. And typically we were preparing our own dinner together and then having dinner and discussing I love it business.
And, so we were, we, we were doing this with companies such as slide Me. GetJar, Opera, Yandex. I remember GetJar, These guys nowadays, they vanished and, looking into what is the, the, of course, the, the, the, the landscape now it's quite different, but to say that it was really difficult for companies to survive in this industry and in the distribution.
Of mobile games and apps. And, but we, we feel that things are changing for the first time, really changing and we DMA and all the changes from regulators and the push from regulators, and , we've been engaged with, with the regulators, especially in Europe for, for a long time, we see that clearly the market is opening and, just to give you an example, we launched this year, our game store for iOS, and then, well, this was impossible until 2024.
So it took from 2027 to 2024 to, to open, to be able to open the market and to be able to have, an alternative game store. In iOS, it's still not there. There's friction. There's, of course, challenge ahead. But what we are seeing is that this is moving fast and the pace is faster nowadays. We see, for example, in the last couple of months, so many news about things that will probably happen in the coming months that will reshape this, this, this industry that we strongly believe that the, the coming, we have tailwind and in the coming years, we have a huge opportunity. Of course, we will also have more competitors, but we think this is, this is healthy and it's good. And actually that's good for us.
We want to have more, we want for developers to consider alternative stores, and if we are. Pitching this to developers by ourselves alone in the market. It's not easy. We believe that having more players in the market helps this and, it will become healthy. And the market is so big that there will be space for different stores, different distribution models, and even niche stores can make a lot of money across the globe, so it's not an issue. And, and we believe that this, the market will be reshaped in two, three years, two, three years time.
Niko: I know you've been a big proponent, and have been involved actually. I, it sounds like in the process of opening up the markets, especially in Europe, tell me, Tell us, tell our listeners a bit more about how you've been pushing this.
Who's been involved in these efforts? How long has it taken? How hard has it been to get to this point? And then we'll talk a little bit more about what you see happening in the future. You just touched on it a little bit there about what you think is going to happen in the next two to three years, opening up competition and so on.
But I want to go a little bit deeper, a layer deeper there. So let's, let's start with what was your role, what was Aptoide's role in Opening up the markets that you're the first person on the on the podcast who has had an inside look in the European markets doing this. And so I'm really curious.
And I know our listeners are really curious to hear how did this come to be? And what was your role and others role in this process?
Alvaro: Sure. we start to, to, to talk and engage with the European commission back in 2014. So 10, 10 years ago.
Niko: Okay. So, Oh my goodness me. Things don't move very quickly, do they?
Alvaro: No, unfortunately, I think they are moving faster nowadays, but, uh, and that's good news, hopefully much faster than, than before, but, but in 2014, we, we did our first complaint because we were seeing a lot of constraints in the market , and several things that we felt that Google is doing.
They are not, they are infringing the law. This is, is they abusing their dominant position and we need to, to react to this. And so it was our first complaint. If you Google it, you will find several news about about what we did back in 2014. It was the first time we engaged with them. And since then, we've been talking with the commission and providing them, of course, some insights, especially on the technical side about what's going on.
And what are the things we feel that, are fair or unfair in this market that needs to be fixed. And then the second important moment in the, this relation with the, with the regulators was back in 2019. We had some issues because all of a sudden, many users across, across the globe started to, started to being prevented from using Aptoide.
Aptoide was vanishing from their devices. All of a sudden. And then, and this was something that was happened of Google play protect. We can again to the commission and, again, uh, a complaint about this, and actually this time we did it also in us, we, the department of justice. So also since then, we've been talking with the department of justice and also helping them out to understand.
What's going on in this industry and the constraints we the alternative stars have been facing and the developers actually because this is also a constraint for the developers to be able to. Have the freedom to distribute themselves if they want. And that's something that is happening. So besides those, then we also have been talking with several regulators across the globe, for example, in Japan, and we met them several times, and so we've been proactively trying to, to push and try to, to make sure that the regulators fully understand what's going on technically and more in detail.
And I think we have some contribution to what you see today in, in, in Europe with VMA, but also what you see today in other countries, for example, Japan. Just approved a new law to also to similar to the ma that will open up the japanese markets starting in 2025 So we were part of the process, of course It's well, it was not because of us, but there was a contribution definitely from our from peptide in this in the sectors efforts and in these changes that are happening now more than A few years ago, for sure.
Niko: Well, I mean, congratulations, that persistence pays off. And I, you know, this is a decade plus process you've, you've been involved in. So congratulations on the outcome that you've gotten. I think it's a huge win for, for developers is a huge win for consumers. In my opinion, I'm editorializing here a little bit.
I'm sure we have some listeners who may not agree who may work for the, for these large duopoly type companies. What do you think the impact is going to be globally? I mentioned in my intro, but I think personally think that this is, the dominoes will start to fall, so to speak, where you've seen Japan now starting next year.
Do you see this as a continuing trend across the world? Is, is this just the starting point? And now we're going to see the United States and other larger economies also follow suit here. I mean, obviously European union is a big block, you know, probably the second biggest block, second or third biggest block after some of the Asian countries after the United States.
So where do you see it going next? And how quickly do you see this now accelerating in terms of taking on its own life and actually becoming kind of a self perpetuating, self fulfilling prophecy?
Alvaro: I feel that with DMA and what started to happen in Europe and then was followed by other countries also happening in the U S especially with the lawsuits from Epic, et cetera, which is a big push also.
Definitely. But we are seeing Japan, UK, so new laws flourishing now in different countries. So this will speed up definitely. And, well, if we try to imagine the, this market in two, three years from now, ironically, you can look into for openness. You can look to China because actually in China, there's multiple App stores.
I remember a few years ago when we first opened our office there, back in 2016, and that, some, some partner was saying, okay, today there's around 400 app stores in China. And I'm not sure if there's 400 today, but if you look into the market share, the biggest one has 30 something percent, and then some follow with 20%.
And this is quite split and spread between different stars. So that's exactly what I think will happen in the market. Of course, the incumbents and the big players will still live a big, very big slice of the market. Definitely. But, Imagine that 30 percent or 40 percent of the market all of a sudden is in the hands of different stars and different distribution platforms.
So this is the kind of landscape that I believe we will find in two, three years time from, now. Yeah.
Niko: Do you think it's going to be similar to China where you do have a couple of players who have, you know, 20, 30 percent or is it too late? Is that boat sailed because Apple and Google are got such a big share and it's going to be really hard.
Other than like you mentioned niche, niche stores, is that where you see it going more? It's like these smaller niche things that are doing very specific things and have very specific, use cases, very specific incentives for developers and consumers, or do you see, is there an opportunity for?
Somebody like an Aptoide to nab a lot of market share now, because you've been in market for a long time. You've got a lot of the tooling in place. I think it'd be very hard for a brand new startup to come and take a lot of market share. Cause good as me, you've got a decade and a half under your belts and , a lot of learnings and tooling.
Yeah, what is, what does the market look like? Does it look like. What it looks like in China with a couple of other big players, in addition to Google and Apple, or is it more, okay, there's going to be a sliver 10 percent or whatever, a small part of the market. That's going to be split across lots of different niche stores.
Alvaro: I think the big place, of course you have Google and Apple definitely. And then third and fourth and fifth, you will have like, I would say three, four, five big stores, and then you will have niches, and smaller, smaller players, very targeted. And niche I've been. In different verticals, but it can also be in different geographies.
For example, I imagine that you could have, let's say Korea, and you have an example of one star that's, that has success in that specific market. I think there will be more space. For, for, for app stores that are targeting specific audience, specific geographies. And because you have this, in some countries, a cultural gap where it makes sense to have a store that is tailor made for that specific market.
And Korea is a good example or Japan or, and, and so I believe you also have that, but I think that it will be a mix of, okay, you have Google and Apple for sure companies such as appetite because of all the experience and expertise. And you were saying, okay, we, we had all, all the tools to be able to offer something that is compelling for the market on both sides of, of course, of the, of the market developers and users.
But then you will have also these big players like, okay, you, there wasn't, were announcements and launches from Epic, from Microsoft. And I think these will be also key players in, in the future, or at least some of them will, will succeed for sure. And then the, the investment they are willing to make in this market is considerable, and I believe that they will have a relevant share of the market.
So I would say that you will have four or five, at least more stores on top of the two or the two, the two incumbents.
Niko: One thing I know that you guys focus on a lot, and maybe this ties into some of the specific things that That you can do for developers. I know you're, you're known for prioritizing user privacy and also reducing geo restrictions.
Why has this been a focus of yours and how does it benefit users and developers compared to other app stores?
Alvaro: So I think so in yearly base, those two things were really compelling and were a key differentiator for us to succeed compared with other stores that were there in the market. In, alternative stores.
So one jurisdiction. So because we were open, an open platform and the user generated platform, meaning that people could upload content to, to the platform, like you can do in YouTube. Same, same concept. This meant that there many times we had like apps that were not available, through Google Play, for example, were available to users in a specific market through our platform.
And this was relevant because of course, many times companies decided not to distribute or for some reason was not available and we could give access to, to users. And this was a use case that definitely made some difference. The other one is that since the one because you know, Google and Apple are always saying, Okay, we are very secure platform.
So we are safe harbor for users and which is actually true. They are quite safe, but, uh, For example, I remember we had some study from a Japanese university a few years ago, comparing different stores. And, , we were at the time like three years ago at the same level as Google and Apple in terms of security.
So we were, we were scanning everything, making sure that all the content that we have is safe for users. And then, and, so we practice is very similar to those two companies. But on top of that. We also think that it's important for, for the privacy of users. And one of the things we do, for example, of course, we don't use the data from users to any other means to, to any other, to using other platforms or that we have, we are only focused on this industry, but on more important than that.
For example, if you want to download a game or app, an app from, from our You don't need to sign up with us. We don't have any information about you. We don't collect your data and keep it in our service. Actually, our policies try to keep as less as possible information because we think this, in order to respect users, but also to make sure that, , okay, all systems are F can fail and we don't want to have this exposed in any ways.
So we strongly believe that having, of course we need some information for sure from users, but not trying to collect it. Is really a key part of what we do. And we make sure that we have minimum information about users. So, we try to protect this as much as possible.
Niko: One thing I forgot to ask earlier on, and I was inspired because you just mentioned a lot of the work that you seem to do to make sure that is secure.
I mean, obviously it doesn't come for free and you need a team to do that. How big is your team? You mentioned offices around the world. How many offices do you have and how many employees are working? And roughly the spread across the different functions, you know, whether it's marketing or engineering or product or whatever.
Alvaro: Yeah. So in total, we are one in the people, most of the, of the, of the team is based in Portugal, different regions, because we, the hybrid policy, people can leave anywhere in the country. We have some also living abroad, but mostly living here in Portugal, Portuguese and foreigners. And, and then.
We currently, we used to have an office in Singapore in a couple of years ago. We decided to close. It didn't make any sense anymore because we were growing back in the days, a lot in Southeast Asia now is not so much of growing, driving, gross geography. So we decided to, to close that one and we keep one in, in an office in China.
So currently we have two offices on in Chinese more, more about engaging with, with developers, especially game developers, for sure. And the industry there is huge and growing. But also with partners, meaning for example, device manufacturers that are relevant for us, for example, to bring more channels and more opportunities to, to the developers in, in our platform.
And, in terms of, okay, split the, our marketing and biz dev teams are very small ones that we are talking about in total, maybe 10 people. And most of the team, technical team, engineering, but also product team. So the, the biggest teams we have within the company are, are the, the product, different products.
So the app store, of course, the wallet is the second, second product. And Catapult, which is now it's being rebranded as Aptoide Connect. It's the platform for distribution across multiple channels. Then we, of course we have everything infrastructure, microservices and technology developing like the SDK and all the technology, for example, the platform that, That, validates and creates content is developed by this team app tech.
And so they make sure that, okay, the content is all screened in our platform. Typically everything is automated, of course, sometimes with user intervention, but, but this is also a key part, all the, the backend part of, of the store is quite relevant and actually people sometimes don't realize how much is going on in the background on an app store.
It's not only about the front end. There's a lot of services behind and it's quite a quite complex operation
Niko: and talking about complexity. You're also. Now available on, on web, you're on TV or some, some TV, smart TVs and automotive platforms as well. I'm guessing, you know, Android auto slash something like that.
Tell me more about those initiatives. It seems like you've got your hands full with. Your core technology and the core product, the app store, but you also have these pushes into alternative channels like tv and cars, it sounds like. So what's the thinking behind that? How does that help developers and consumers?
And how big a part of your business are they? And how big do you see them becoming in the future?
Alvaro: Sure, sure. So at the visa is an old project. So we launched in the early days of Android TVs and It's, it's been in a plateau, it's not something that is growing to be, to be honest, nevertheless, it helped us also to reach more users and to, to be more compelling to, to developers because, okay, it's another channel and you can also distribute with us to Android TVs.
The automotive market, it's a different story. So we back in 2019, we did a joint venture with a big company called Foreshia, which is one of the biggest top 10 suppliers of the automotive industry. It's a French company. And, because they understood that, okay, we really need to move into digital.
It's not only about building, tires and stuff like that and bumpers. And it's more about digital now. And we, we need the help of someone that really knows this business. So, we did a joint venture for the automotive and it was, it's a very interesting project because, okay.
And definitely the digital experience is expanding within inside cars. And this is with connected cars and, and digital, the digital experience is, is, is nowadays more relevant than many other things. You, you look into the advertising of cars today, and they are all about, The digital experience, not so much about the car.
This became really relevant. And then, so we work with Forecia and actually we, we, we build up, we did the, the building blocks for, an app store for cars. Based on Android, but not with Google services. And actually we, you have a slice of the market that is actually pushing for a solution based on Android.
But we not without relying on, on Google, on the Google services, because of course the, the car industry also wants to be independent. They understood what happened in the mobile space and they want, they don't. Want to have the same situation in a few years from now. So they are trying to push to alternative solutions.
And actually, so our, we engage with several companies like Mercedes, BMW, Volkswagen, chat, also some Chinese car manufacturers, and they use part of our technology of the app store of or of the distribution platform to provide content to users in the in cars. So in a nutshell, I would say that, okay, for us, we see distribution as something that can reach different markets.
And if we see an opportunity there, if it's something that benefits. On one side developers and gives them more reach in terms of Engaging with users it makes sense to us It also makes sense for us to given our expertise and our experience to provide a solution for example in cars, which is That the challenges there might in some ways be different, but the basis are the same, so it makes sense for us to expand and to also to take benefit of what we acquired in terms of technology and know
Niko: I'm really fascinated by the car and to me it's a kind of the final frontier for, you know, technology and entertainment, and fun fact, I founded a company, co-founded a company in 2018 called drive FM, which was making voice powered games for the driver of the car. And it was going really well, until the pandemic hit when nobody was driving anymore, or in their cars. But what was the most frustrating part about that was, was exactly what you're describing, which is we were completely reliant on Apple and Google approving.
Our app, our product, in the, for car play or for Android auto. And they didn't because they didn't have a games category. Cause we were like way ahead of our time, you know, no, we don't play games in cars, right? It's too dangerous, et cetera. But we're like, well, it's a voice game. You don't have to look at the screen.
So yeah, so what you were telling me as a developer that resonates very strongly being at the mercy of these, these gatekeepers with what we thought was a really innovative product, which I still have huge conviction in That the car is one of those places that you're stuck in, you're a captive audience to the most extreme degree and developers have a real opportunity.
If they come up with innovative solutions, whether it be gaming or otherwise to reach these consumers, you're at the mercy of Apple and Google for them to approve your product. So, so yeah, what you're saying. Really resonates, especially as the in the automotive use case resonates for me, having been through, through some of that pain.
Okay, we're coming up to time here, but I do want to talk a little bit about the future. What is your kind of vision? You've been in business for a decade and a half seems like you're kind of hitting your strides starting 2018 and, and tip, you know, hitting some of these developers of, you know, game developers, and realizing there's a good audience there.
There's, there's growth there. What is the next? Decade or 15 years look like for you, after it specifically, but also alternative app stores and some of these more wild swings at the bat, like in the car, for example, or on your TV or, or wherever, what, what would success look like a decade and a half from now for, for you and for the industry in general?
Alvaro: And I think that, well, first of all, you have, of course, these changes in the market with the regulators and some companies pushing for opening it. So the landscape will be different. That's definitely so people will have more options and developers will have more options. That's, that's obvious to me. But I think like we, we felt back in 2017 with blockchain, that's okay.
There's. This new technology and new opportunity to dramatically change the markets. We also feel the same today, not only because of this opening, but because if there are more companies, startups, or even big corporates being able to have access to these users and to this market, they will invest in it.
And one of the things that I think will reshape can reshape completely what is the experience is AI. So that's where we are investing also. And we feel that, okay, the experience of, uh, discovering content, discovering new games needs to change dramatically. It's really, to be honest, in the current story experience.
It's quite boring. It's quite boring. It's not compelling. It's difficult for you to find out what you really want. And, it's not something you are excited about. Oh, I'm going to the store. I'm really excited about going to it. Maybe you are, if you're going to, if you love cycling to your bicycle store or to, but not for this, the game stores and app stores that we currently have.
And I think this experience will change dramatically, mostly with AI. Of course you will have, okay. And other channels, other opportunities outside the mobile. I'm a big fan of AR, VR. I think it's. It will take some time, so it won't be something that will happen in one year or two, but we'll, you will have changes there and new channels.
Like we were talking about cars, I think car is, is, is key there. And even I see space in cars, for example, for AR and it makes full sense to me. They are in the car because, uh, actually you don't need the Googles. It could benefit from being in the car, inside the car and every AR or around you, and that's the kind of things we might see in the, in the future, in the near future, but I think the two things opening the market through the, the separate of regulators and the second and, and, and companies in the industry.
And the second one. I think that will dramatically change the experience is a, yeah.
Niko: I haven't been, you know, I mentioned I'm an iOS user. I have been for a really long time and I've got a MacBook pro and all that stuff. Right. So very much locked into the Apple ecosystem and I haven't been, I haven't, I used to go there all the time in the early days when it was exciting and it was interesting and there was new stuff.
Now I go there and it's just the top grossing games. You know, if I go to the, you know, Apple, just, you know, Just their curated apps. Like they don't interest me in the slightest. You know, and I just go through word of mouth, somebody recommending things. By the way, we got a question on that in a second.
So maybe you can recommend me something. But, yeah, I completely agree with you. I think the app stores are just it's a one size fits all type experience. I mean, maybe localized by country, but that's it. Like, really, like everybody in the United States or everybody in Portugal is treated the same with the same storefront.
That doesn't make any sense. I think in this era of Personalization and especially now that you have AI that can actually, you know, figure out very quickly what you're into and what you're not surface things that are both maybe you'll like, but also by kind of left field things that Apple would never feature in the app store or Google play would never feature in the app store.
So really interested in seeing what that. What that looks like, and I don't think we can get imagine exactly how many changes and how big a change that might bring, to the storefronts. So very excited. I mean, most web stores are doing this already, right? Like if you're if you sell on the web and you're like a niche, you know, you sell certain kinds of shoes or whatever.
They're already doing this, right? Because they know that you need to be personalized for your consumers and you can't do one size fits all. And yet somehow even Though it's digital, that's where we're furthest behind. Arguably. Yeah, we should be in the front line of it, of innovation in that aspect that we are not.
I completely agree. You're preaching to the right here. Okay. Well, we are gaming podcast. And so I have a final fun question, hopefully, hopefully fun question, for all of our guests. And that question is what three games are you currently playing or are most excited by for, you know, in the future?
Alvaro: Okay, sure. Well, actually, I wouldn't say that nowadays I used to play a lot and, the game I played the most in my life was StarCraft, with friends and it's what I was the choice. I was crazy about it. Nowadays, I would say that I test games, I don't play them because, well, on Aptoide, and currently, for example, the ones I installed in the last few days were games that came in to our platform recently.
One example is The Lord of the Rings from NetEase. It's a new game that they launched and it came to our platform. So Just playing it to, to understand the, the, the, the Mac and the mechanics of it, and also the IP part, top 11, which is from Nordeo's, soccer manager,
Niko: Huge football manager fan. We don't, we don't have time for this.
I saw football, I'm going to tell this anyway. Sorry, sorry folks. So, I was at Zynga and I was love to bring a story from Zynga, from a past early Zynga and I remember seeing, top 11 when it first launched on Facebook canvas, this is pre mobile, this is pre mobile app stores even. And I saw the engagement rates and in those days, I can't remember what the name of the service was, but it was the one that was bought by Facebook so that they could like have all the insights into what What's going on.
And, but at that point, the service was free to use and it was out available for any developer. And I remember seeing the engagement rates for that game. And by engagement, I mean, DAU over MAU. Right. And it was like 70, 80 percent DAU over MAU, which is as high as Facebook, as high as like a top social product.
And I tried to get Mark Pincus to buy the company. Cause I was like, I guarantee you, this thing is going to be a big hit. Like this is going to be huge. Like these engagement numbers. And I'm pretty sure we could have got them relatively cheap at that point. And, marketing is famously doesn't like sports or sports games.
And so he was like, eh, no, we're not doing it. And then of course, fast forward to, you know, where we are today. And of course they're huge. And they've got Jose Mourinho as they're like, you know, apps, app icon and all that kind of stuff. So anyway, sorry to hijack, hijack your three, three games, but boy, when you say like top 11 and football manager, that genre, like that's one of my biggest, most beloved games. And I. Put in thousands of hours on football manager.
Alvaro: Okay. Well, that's great to know. So several others that I'm testing, but for example, zombie IO, it's a small game, but it's a, a game from joint net game. So the guys are the legend of mushroom and, which was a big hit a few months ago in the, in the beginning of the year, and also was one of the games we, we launched on our platform and they've been launching several other games and we've been following that and also launching them in our platform.
So. Those are some, some examples, but again, I'm mostly testing games nowadays and playing them and spending real long time playing them typically a shift from one
Niko: to the other, that's it. All right. Okay. Well, at least you're still getting to play games. I do think that it's important to stay, stay youthful and stay young and have fun and play games.
And I think that if all of us played more games, the world would be a better place. But anyway, on that note, on that note, I just want to say huge thank you for coming on the, on the pod today. Like I've just really enjoyed talking to you. I've really learned a lot. I'm fascinated by this world.
I started digging into it after, I learned about Aptoide and I was like, Oh, wow. Like, you know, this, these numbers are, are legit. So thank you again. And, welcome back anytime. If you have any news to share, always welcome back.
Alvaro: Thank you, Niko. It was a, it was a pleasure. Thank you very much.
Niko: Of course. And as always a big thank you to all of our listeners. We'll be back next week with more interviews, more insights, and more analysis from the weird and wonderful world of gaming. So until next time, friends, feel free to send me questions, guest recommendations, and comments. My email is [email protected].
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