Apple WWDC 2012

Apple kicked off its 23rd WWDC today.  Tim Cook took only several minutes to start the conference, and shared eye opening stats with all Apple developers.

There are 400 million Apple App Store accounts that are connected with credit card information.  These are not Facebook accounts that are created with your email addresses.  These are accounts that are linked with credit card that can be used instantly to purchase apps.

400 million accounts with credit cards;
that's a big number.

These accounts are created largely due to explosion of apps in App Store.  There are 650,000 apps in App Store.  Out of these apps, 225,000 of them are apps specifically designed for iPad.  This explosion of apps is what's drawing the ready-to-purchase accounts and in turn attracting more talents into Apple's development platform.

This virtuous cycle is what made Apple so successful.  Understanding how to deliver killer experience for customers and providing tools and platforms for developers to tap into the consumer market created by its new devices has been the key.

You can watch the full video of opening sessions for WWDC 2012 from here.