Xiaomi's Software Explosion: Chinese Manufacturer Announces 10 Billion Downloads On Mi App Store

Breakout Chinese manufacturer Xiaomi may have plans to slow down its international expansion, but its software base continues to grow rapidly. Just two and a half years after its establishment, Xiaomi’s Mi App Store has surpassed 10 billion downloads, with the majority occurring in 2014.

The Mi App Store sees more than 50 million downloads daily, Xiaomi announced via its blog Tuesday. Xiaomi’s apps and services are known to be its primary source of revenue, but the manufacturer is not the only one getting paid. Its developers have collectively earned 364 million RMB ($59 million) in revenue just from January through October 2014.

While Xiaomi has seen considerable growth in the last year alone, it still has some ways to go before catching up to rivals Samsung Electronics Co., Google Inc. and Apple Inc. Google had more than 50 billion downloads from its Google Play Store as of July 2013, while Apple had more than 85 billion downloads from its Apple App store as of October 2014, according to research firm Statista.

Both Google and Apple already have global reaches, unlike Xiaomi; and reports indicate that Google’s apps and services, including the Google Play Store, will soon be available in China, where it is currently banned.

Xiaomi currently caters to the Chinese market and neighbors in East Asia, but has long-term goals for an international expansion. It plans to ramp up efforts in more distant Asian markets like India and Indonesia, and will venture into Brazil, Russia, Thailand, Mexico and Turkey in the future. The international Mi App Store website is currently available to developers in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore, allowing third-party software makers to upload their own applications onto the Mi App Store.

The four-year-old company has earned a range of accolades. Its strategy of offering low-cost devices at a loss while promoting its apps and services have helped Xiaomi become the third-largest e-commerce company in China. Additionally, both IDC and Strategy Analytics named Xiaomi the third largest smartphone manufacturer as of the third quarter with up to 18 million handsets shipped, despite the fact that many competitors, including Lenovo and Huawei, contest the claim.