App analytics firm Flurry said that there has been a notable shift in US portable games software revenue, with Android and iOS set to overtake Nintendo’s DS platform in full-year 2011.
Last year, the Nintendo platform accounted for 57 percent of revenue, with Sony’s PSP having a 9 percent share, and Android and iOS having 34 percent jointly. Based on its full-year 2011 estimates, Flurry believes that the DS will have 36 percent of the market by revenue, with PSP falling to 6 percent, and Android/iOS growing to 58 percent.
The company estimates the US mobile games market to be worth US$3.3 billion in 2011, compared with US$2.5 billion in 2010, which was a slight decrease from US$2.7 billion in 2009.
In a blog post, Flurry said that “no industry has been more impacted by digital distribution than video games,” and that “leading the disruption are iOS and Android devices, whose free and inexpensive games, distributed across a massive installed base of powerful and networked tablet and mobile phone form factors, have already disrupted billions of dollars of game revenue.”
It was also noted that the change in business model is likely to be extended into the living room, with both Apple and Google moving into the TV category. “Ostensibly, this new class of hardware will create a new platform upon which the digital distribution model of apps will be overlaid,” the analytics firm said – challenging Nintendo, as well as Microsoft and Sony, on its home-turf.
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