Finland Times

Last year saw an increase of 50 percent in billings from App Store and its developers around the world earned over 10 billion dollars from apps and games sales over the year, according to Apple's announcement.  

Apple credits much of the sales success to the introduction of iOS 8, saying the most significant iOS update ever helped developers create new apps with innovative features, which have been well received by customers.

Following a record-breaking year, App Store experienced in the first week of 2015 a new record in billings with customers around the world spending nearly half a billion dollars on apps and in-app purchases. New Year's Day 2015 marked the single biggest day ever in App Store sales history.

"This year is off to a tremendous start after a record-breaking year for the App Store and our developer community," said Eddy Cue, Apple's senior vice president of Internet software and services.

"We're so proud of the creativity and innovation developers bring to the apps they create for iOS users and that the developer community has now earned over 25 billion U.S. dollars."

Launched in 2008, App Store helped ignite the app revolution and an entire industry has been developed ever since around app design and development. The iOS ecosystem has helped create over 627,000 jobs in America alone and U.S.-based developers have earned more than 8 billion dollars from App Store's global sales, Apple said.

App Store now provides iOS devices users over 1.4 million apps in 24 wide-ranging categories, including games, social networking, photo and video, sports, health & fitness, travel, kids and many more. The newest generation of independent game creators are described by Apple as "an especially inspired segment" of developers.