Session: Unlocking The iOS Platform For User Growth – Key Updates On DMA, DMCC & Emerging....

[Music] next up we've got a talk that is unlocking the iOS platform for user growth and big round of applause and welcome my speaker on stage please guys good morning everybody um thank you for being here my name is paulus I'm co-founder and CEO of aptoid um and today I will raise some questions more questions than answers and give you some numbers some facts about regulation and how this can have impact in user acquisition in iOS and a little bit outside IOS as well to start with just in a nutshell optoid just for you to know what we do we we have Booth out

there so we have 50 million monthly active users in our ecosystem of apps distribution so we operate app stores we push our content from our developers to 10 app stores four of them operated by as six operated by partners and we get users for new users for the developers that work with us we work with more than 100,000 certified applications some most question asked us is how much we can grow the revenue of course depends of the type of game or up but typically 10 to 20% on top of what is done in Google Play uh because mostly we operate in Android at the time being our geographies are mostly us and Europe but we do have users a little bit uh those 50 million across different regions deep diving on iOS platform and regulations and what's going on that can have impact in user acquisition so just very quickly there are 1.4 billion iPhone users users H the last number we

got got is that in 2022 Apple paid $60 billion to developers and that Google and apple together uh control 95% of in up purchase that is going on through games and um and apps outside web pay Shops and and also that 75% of iOS users choose to op out from tracking also important to understand the the following slides and iOS users are typically more valuable than Android users so there is these uh sources that said that they spend usually more 2.5 times than the Android User so where are developers investing in acquisition of user so I try to in this table to summarize from different sources what where are being invested the the the money and we can see that Inay marketing is typically where developers need to invest more to get users so much more than organic nowadays

and typically we see social media ads ad networks and advanced strategies like look like audience and advanced analytics to to to take the the most of the the investment there are also organic marketing and other strategies but those is are the ones that take more money H and create more investment and one one question uh also interesting is understanding okay we know that the iOS users are typically more valuable than Android users how about the cost customer acquisition cost typically these are two different sources just for us to cross them and typically they are also more expensive as you uh likely know so for instance uh it just says that it could be depending on the general of course from 56 cents in 2024 to $174 and while for instance misplay foreen for their platform of course is incentivized rewarded ads that is

between 30 to 50% more in iOS cost of acquisition we also know this just to to get it from different sources how about um acquisition is because um in the when we talk with different people in meetings everybody gets the perception that the acquisition cost in iOS is getting more expensive so looking into different acquisition platforms meta ads Tik Tok Google ads and net networks we can see that in the last years 5 years since 2021 um 2020 2021 the the cost have been rising 60% across in average across these platforms just in iOS alone so actually the cost is of acquisition to users is increasing and what is the top three reasons the the main one is of course the up tracking transparency introduced in iOS 14 in 20 back in 2021 and uh 14.5

and that introduces the the difficulty to access the idfa which makes uh tracking and targeting much harder but there is also from different um sources the the the perception of increased competition in the mobile marketing there is more competition more developers trying to get user attention they cannot get it uh organically so they need to acquire the users through pay performance and other channels and also the ad platform inflation as there was more merging and consolidation in ad platforms we see that actually the the price of acquiring the users and the margins of the networks themselves are growing and that of course have impact in the acquisition cost of the users and if we having the the previous slides we can see that the main acquisition costs and retention costs are platform costs the the fee charged by Apple and by Google of 30% but also

the acquisition cost in uh pay marketing strategies as I just shown so how this can be somehow um worked out with uh the current regulations and Court decisions so I introduce here three regulations and one Court decision that might have impact in your strategy for the future in terms of iOS user acquisition I will start by in Europe by digital Market act that was introduced in 2022 in in European Union the 27 countries and that somehow tried to regulate how big Tech and the big companies uh operate in the market creating competition and creating better conditions for up developers these EU digital markets act as I said was was um being passed in 2022 and but is a very slow timeline so it it gives first designate Gatekeepers around 2023 gives them time to comply

and so on and so on I will say in which moment we are on dma but before that I will introduce other two regulations that can have impact in uh your business the first is here in UK so in UK we'll have a very similar law called dmcc um digital markets competition and consumer bill that was passed in May 2024 last year that law is very similar to the dma it was inspired in in that and we the same openness that um dma pushed in iOS ecosystem we likely will see in UK as well and finally another regulation Japan so in Japan in June just one month after the MCC there was passed the smartphone act law that actually opens Japan also to more competition in the digital markets and specifically in app stores and app distribution so we see that The

Regulators across these three regions and countries are somehow aligning the same kind of push for Apple and Google and lastly uh a court decision so in United States epic as you might see uh sued Google and apple and apple decision uh was not so uh so favorable to Epic but the Google was so what the court last year said to Google is that Google would have to do remedies because he was urging the competition in US was a court decision not a regulation or a law and the judge judge decided that Google had to do several things one of them was to allow other app stores like Apptoid App Store epic app store and others to be distributed through Google play this would mean that um when the the decision is implemented you could search for epic game store app toid game store inside Google Play which as you can imagine lower the friction for other app St stores to be installed in

Android secondly it decided that the other app stores is a little bit amazing this decision other app stores must have access to the to the catalog of Google Play The 3 million applications and the developers don't need to op in just have the possibility to opt out this of course would reduce the friction um for the the users to find things that are useful in other app stores and some other smaller remedies these two were the the most important ones and this is important why because Google appealed from this decision so In This Moment is under the appeal court and we'll see soon what is the result of that appeal from Google if this decision applies we can see first in Android I would say much more competition in the apps distribution in us that might spill over other regions after this so this is what there are other things going on of course we don't have in 20 minutes time to go through all of them but these are the ones I think have more

impact for user acquisition in iOS I mentioned some of the Android cases because it's really interesting and could have impact in iOS as well what are the impacts of these changes in terms of game developers and app developers so the first thing is in these regions and for the time being in Europe but as I said in UK and Japan in 2025 improved Revenue fee from the App Store from 30% to 20% % this is something that the app developers can already do they have some caveats I will try to explain those caveats but it's already available in Europe the second one is outside the App Store also alternative stores and distributions in iOS there are three official app stores today Apptoid epic and out store so this means that in Europe those three stores are available to get new users and finally alternative building options also uh for seen by digital markets act

dmcc and smartphone act that allows billing options and external links to be available in Android and iOS this is also covered so these three things is are where the developers can get a website from the current regulation well of course Apple will not try to give this 180 billion market and without some friction so uh in order for you to accomplish these three things or three opportunities that I just mentioned in the the previous slide um Apple introduced three different frictions the first friction is that developers that want in Europe to benefit from the 20% reduced fee must sign the new distribution terms those distribution terms of course have some kind of downsizes as well but Apple introduced something very curious is that if you signed by the new distribution terms and you distributed to an alternative app store you cannot go back clearly creating fear under the

developers the second one is you need to submit your app your Apple iOS app not to the App Store itself like in Android but you need to submit to Apple netization system actually it works it works well it's not a big burden but it goes through Apple connect third and last and this is the most well-known you must have heard about it which is core technology fee of 50 cents of hero that the develop ER and the app store by the way in addition have to pay to Apple those 50 cents this is somehow somehow difficult to understand it's 50 cents per user per year which means if the user installs two times a year the developer just puse once but if it installs one time in December and it installs again in in January the next year you pay twice okay this is the core technology fee of course this is a a a big burden to developers and to up

stores so that's why the commission opened a formal investigation against Apple in June 2024 so it's ongoing a formal investigation where the the commission actually um addresses not only these points but the fourth one and the fourth one is the friction that apple is introducing for installation alternative app stores so until March 2025 not far away from now Apple has to comply with the things that it needs to comply with digital markets act if apple does not does not comply until March 2025 which may be 12 months and that was designated gatekeeper it has to pay a fine that goes between 10 and 20% of the global gmv so the the entire Apple gmv which is more or less 10% is how the revenue in Europe accounts for for Apple

so what are the opportunities the the main categories of opportunities on iOS first user acquisition in networks Le lowering the cost of the Ina purchase fee to something more um around 10% second to converting existing user base to existing users again you can get a a fee from Apptoid or your own web pay shop more around 5 to 10% and get promoted and receive special featuring in alternative app stores because of course uptoid epic out store are getting better promotion in featuring to developers that on board what we suggest is first to adapt your compliance and to your rules to the new rules from Apple second Innovation to think about business cases that could work in your platform and and finally optimization through those business cases could be organic could be pay acquisition to try to optimize on the iOS platform to these alternative channels

so just very quickly as we are ending the time but we are now working in abtoid iOS with 30 game developers mostly game developers and we are working in business cases like pay acquisition in networks redirected to uptoid iOS direct to Consumer getting existing users and organic promotion it's easy for us to to get the users the the user base is not as big as in Android so we are talking a much smaller user base but we are optimistic about the expansion in the future months um under the the new regulations in Japan and UK and others just a very quick example I don't know if you can go through the video is the video one if not no problem this would be the installation of an alternative of store or we can yeah next one you got I'll try again no wor so the video I had and just before going

to the last slide is just what is the flow to install abtoid iOS in Europe um but we can we can see it online future outlook uh as I mentioned the regulations will push likely other markets to iOS to open to iOS and alternative stores my guess but it's not nothing public or a fact but my guess it will be in iOS 18.4 for SE to April maybe later but to comply with the dmcc and smartphone law should be around that age and Google will likely need to change under the the not only the court case but doj the friction points in installation unlocking new business cases and we see also Apple changing those three points uiux CTF and more flexibility to developers under the formal investigation from the European commission and we'll see acquisition strategies that pay off and deliver more impact to your acquisition strategies if you want to know more um you can look

in any of the three app stores official app stores approved by Apple that I just mentioned you can also look into the Apple's Apple have a calculator that allows you to see for your game how much you to pay under the new terms and finally if you want to Deep dive on some of these topics I have some articles in some articles in LinkedIn that might help you thank you very much [Applause]