Appliya Studio Makes Anyone an iPhone Application Developer — for a Hefty Price

Posted on 01 July 2009, at 1:30 pm, by Jason Reese

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Japanese mobile application publisher Appliya, Inc has just launched their own rapid application development service with Appliya Studio. Don’t know how to program? Don’t want to pay for a contract programmer to write and design your iPhone application? For a mere $524 (excluding any applicable excise tax), you can use Appliya Studio to create an application. Then sell the app for a sweet return — minus the 30% that Appliya will take out, in addition to the 30% Apple takes as a commission). But wait, there’s more…

appliya

APPLIYA STUDIO provides pre-built, customizable application platforms called Content Application Templates (or, CAT). These app platforms include eBook viewers, quiz games, wallpaper apps, puzzle games, and more. Customers can select any suitable Content Application Template from the APPLIYA STUDIO library. With just a few tweaks, APPLIYA STUDIO can create an app with a unique look and feel to match any customer’s product.

Appliya will then take the application you created with their product and handle submitting it to Apple for you (no word on whether or not you need to register and spend $99 to join Apple’s Standard Developer Program — we’re assuming that is a big “No” since the application will be submitted by Appliya). Now, if there are no alterations required on your app — and if you supply all the images, text, and sounds in the correct formats — there is no additional cost. But, get ready to pay some more if there are any changes that are required before Appliya submits the app you worked on (interestingly, Appliya’s website does not breakdown how much extra you may have to pay should they need to do any work on your application).

After Appliya submits the application to Apple — assuming it is approved without any further work required (which, by the way, will cost extra) – you can sit back and wait for the money to roll in from the App Store. I’m guessing neither you nor Appliya is going to spend any additional money or effort marketing the application (which is smart considering how flooded the App Store is nowadays) — it can be exciting to just wait…and wait…for someone to just stumble over your application).

So, now that you’re an iPhone App Developer with Appliya Studio how much will you make?

APPLIYA only receives 30% of sales, with Apple taking the remaining 30% as commission.

That means you get 40% of the gross sales. OK, let’s say you make an app that sales for $0.99. Just for the sake of argument, it goes through and is approved without a hitch and manages to get 500 interested customers.

500 x $0.99 = $495. Apple’s 30% ($148.50) leaves $364.50. Appliya’s 30% ($148.50) will net you $198. This is IF all the planets align and there are no additional development costs and the application is approved without forcing Appliya to do any tweaking (which will cost you more money). When all is said and done, if this were the scenario, your $524 initial cost would still put you in the hole -$326.

Sign. Me. Up!

I suppose if you had a really awesome application that sold extremely well — consistently month after month– in the midst of all the other apps available, you could make some money using the Appliya services. It just seems that anyone truly wanting to develop iPhone/iPod Touch Apps would stay far away from this type of service to earn 40% (if they are lucky). Learning Objective-C, installing the iPhone SDK, and getting your hands dirty with coding is still going to be your best bet.