PhonePe has announced the launch of the Indus app store in India today. The Indus Appstore is a homegrown app store that is designed to rival the Google Play Store in India. The launch came four months after PhonePe opened its app marketplace to Android developers, inviting them to publish their apps.
The launch of the app store will also give some maneuvering space to India’s top startups and internet firms who are currently engaged in a standoff with Google and its Play Store policies and commission fees.
Interested users can download the Indus Appstore app directly from the company’s website and can manually install the app on their smartphones. As per an earlier report, the company has also partnered with OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) such as Nokia and Lava to incorporate the app store into their devices.
Indus Appstore comes with a range of unique and personalised features. It also offers developer-friendly terms. The app store supports 12 Indian languages apart from English.
Indus Appstore features over 2 lakh mobile apps and games across 45 categories and does not levy any listing fees for one year. In addition to this, PhonePe will not levy any fee if developers use any third-party payment services and gateways.
The Indus Appstore offers a range of localized features to users. Some of these features include app discovery through short videos, signing up to the store using a mobile number instead of an email address, and "smart updates'' that send updates to users' phones during periods of greater data availability.
Indus Appstore is claiming to offer 24/7 support based in India through email or chatbot with a promise of quick solutions to queries, aimed at addressing a common problem that developers have experienced with Google and Apple. Additionally, the platform will provide dedicated account managers.
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