startup hustle

Selling a mobile app (iphone or android) can be a real pain. Over the years I have entertained the idea of selling the first app I came up with in 2008, a soccer app called iSoccer. Apple purposely makes it difficult to transfer ownership of an app from one entity (whether it be an individual or a company) to another. One common solution is for the seller to remove the app from the app store and the buyer resubmits the app under their account. The issue here is certain tracking and relationships are severed when the app jumps accounts. It is the equivalent of buying a house (the app) in a neighborhood (the App Store) but you have to tear the house down and rebuild it down the street. The other option is selling the whole iTunes Connect account, I never felt completely comfortable with that. Then I came across Apptopia.

A few weeks ago I read an article in techcrunch about a new service that brokers the sell of mobile apps. Apptopia is a marketplace that connects developers with those interested in buying mobile apps on the iPhone and Android (and BB, Win7, whatever those are). The startup is trying to solve the problem that many developers have experienced since the launch of the App Store, an exit strategy. Not only that, but as Apptopia explains:

“We will manage the entire process through to completion.  Starting with recommending app valuation & connecting sellers with buyers.  Concluding with escrow services, code review, and interfacing with Apple & Google on your behalf until the deal is done.”

Apptopia is taking all of the pain of finding and transferring the app between the parties. I submitted the iSoccer app and got a response from one of the founders a couple of days wanting a deeper dive in the numbers. They were looking for sales, downloads, active users, and reasons for selling.

Apptopia plans to make money by having a listing fee that will help keep out junk apps. While they have not discussed a fee when since I submitted, it has been stated that the first 200 apps will be included in the marketplace for free. Not positive if I am in that pool or not. The company is currently trying to load the marketplace with apps for sale and will officially launch in February. I will write a follow up post on the (attempted) sale of iSoccer.