Edible Apple

By Luis Estrada:

Even more than the smartphone market, a bustling app store is a requirement to compete in the burgeoning tablet market. And in that regard, absolutely no one can compete with Apple.

Earlier today, MacStories pointed out that the number of dedicated iPad apps now surpasses 100,000. That’s multiple orders of magnitudes greater than the paltry 300 or so dedicated Android Honeycomb apps (at most) currently available on Google’s platform, not to mention similarly lacking app store selections from HP and RIM.

At the end of March we ran a story on the iPad App Store reaching the 75,000 apps milestone in less than 365 days since the original iPad came out in April 2010. Considering the competition the iPad had to face in the past year (though some people say there really isn’t a tablet market) and the options given to developers when it came to choosing which platform to develop for, seeing iPad users gaining access to almost 100,000 apps in roughly 12 months was a surprise — looking back at those statements from tech pundits who claimed the iPad was “dead in the water”, the 75,000 milestone surely helped putting things in perspective.

Yet Apple and third-party developers have set a new record: in 453 days since the original iPad came out on April 3, 2010, the App Store has more than 100,000 iPad-exclusive apps available. Either specifically targeting the tablet, or released as universal updates to existing iPhone apps…

For a multitude of reasons, competitors will have a significantly tougher time making up ground to the iPad than they did with the iPhone. They just don’t know it yet.