PhonePe's Indus Appstore could launch in India by March, says co-founder Akash Dongre

Akash Dongre, Co-founder and CPO of Indus Appstore told CNBC-TV18 that end users can expect to see the app on their smartphones by March.

“We knew that people were going to use apps, but they were constrained in terms of discovering these apps in their local languages. Both locally developed and widely used advanced applications posed challenges for new language users in terms of discovery and download. We saw that as a problem and that’s when we started working on Indus Appstore,” Dongre said.

With the Indus Appstore, PhonePe plans to challenge the monopoly that the Google Play Store has held in the Android smartphone market with about 95% market share in India. This also comes at a crucial time when Google is facing a major setback in the country with its anti-competitive practices.

Dongre said that the industry, developers and original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) are all excited about the launch. “All the major app developers have shown interest and are uploading their applications on the platform. From gaming to content and food delivery, all major names coming on board,” he added.

In December, Indus Appstore announced that they have onboarded renowned leading game developers including Dream11, Nazara Technologies, A23, MPL, Junglee Rummy, Taj Rummy, Rummy Passion, RummyCulture, RummyTime, and CardBaazi.

The platform has also previously said that it will take zero commissions along with no listing fee for the first year, and a nominal fee thereafter. Developers will also have the choice to integrate any payment gateway of their choice inside their apps.

For context, other app stores like Google’s Play Store or Apple’s App Store impose fees ranging from 15-30% on in-app payments.

With a new app store locally developed for the ‘Bharat’ user, the OEMs will also have more freedom as to how they want users to use the apps on their smartphones and have a good experience. Post-launch, users will be able to find the Indus Appstore pre-installed on their smartphones and have the option to download it.

“Most (OEMs) feel that working with an Indian partner that can build a developer ecosystem and bring a large number of users will be beneficial for them from the monetisation perspective. We are seeing a lot of positive interest from OEMs also,” Dongre remarked saying that the platform has already signed a few OEMs and is in the process of closing some big names.

However, disseminating apps in the local languages is not the only way for Indus Appstore to reach its audience. The app store will also allow users to sign up using their phone numbers. The reasoning behind this, according to Dongre, is that most Indian smartphone users do not necessarily have an email ID.

“Most of the Tier-II or Tier-III users, which is the majority of internet users in India, do not have email addresses. That is one of the biggest reasons why a lot of internet users are not able to access the Google Play Store. They have a shopkeeper or someone in their family setting up a Gmail account for them and unfortunately, when they get locked out of it they're not even able to use the app store,” he said.

Indus Appstore was officially launched on September 23 for developers. Its initial expansion phase is said to focus on building a substantial consortium of Android developers on the platform.