On January 25th at the Inside Social Apps conference in San Francisco, Google’s Android platform manager Eric Chu stated that while he is pleased that the number of Android smartphone users is on the rise, purchases of paid apps in the Android Market continue to disappoint.
And it looks like Google is trying to do something about those sluggish numbers.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Google is hiring dozens of software developers to build bigger, better, and faster mobile applications for smartphones in hopes of capturing a bigger chunk of the app marketplace presently dominated by Apple.
The WSJ reports that Google is recruiting software engineers, product managers, user-interface experts and others who have ideas for mobile apps. “Some current Google employees have changed jobs to work on the effort,” one source told the publication.
Despite a consistently strong showing in the face of heated competition, Android users have access only to about 100,000 applications, while Apple’s app store boasts more than 350,000 apps.
To date, Google has created fewer than two dozen apps in house. It now appears that number is poised to grow dramatically.
At present, Google’s hottest apps are those that represent extensions of the Internet giant’s similarly hottest web properties like Google Maps.
Released in 2008, Google’s operating system dubbed Android, powers nearly 150 different smartphones and other connected devices, like tablets.
According to most mobile industry analysts, US sales of Android devices are comparable to those of Apple.
