On the occasion of our first birthday, we’d like to take this opportunity to thank our developer community. It’s been a busy year here at the Amazon Appstore for Android. Our store has grown tremendously since launching one year ago, and we could not have made it happen without partners like you.  In our first year, customers have already bought millions of apps and games for their Kindle Fire and other Android devices. The Amazon Appstore has also grown its selection nearly eight-fold since launch, from 4,000 apps to over 31,000.

During our first year, we introduced Kindle Fire. Since launch, Kindle Fire has helped our developer community connect their apps with engaged customers. "At Quickoffice, we've experienced a massive lift in our Android app sales since the launch of Kindle Fire. The Amazon Appstore has been a great showcase for our app, and we've seen significant gains in conversion rates compared to other app stores based on the integrated Amazon buying experience," said Alan Masarek, CEO of Quickoffice, Inc.

Over the past year, we’ve been listening to your feedback, and we’re working on enhancing our tools and resources to meet your needs. We created blog posts to help your apps fly through testing, to help you message customers within your apps, and to help you develop for Kindle Fire.  Over the last year, we released enhancements to our Developer Portal, including updated developer reports, and new user permissions functionally.  And, we have more upgrades in the works for our second year of operations.  We hope to support you with tools that allow you to continue delighting customers with your apps and games.  In the coming weeks and months, check back here on our developer blog—we’ll be posting information on enhancements.   

We know many of our developers are Amazon customers as well.  To celebrate our first birthday, we worked with several of our developers to offer special discounts on some of our most popular apps. The Amazon Appstore Birthday event will get extra customer visibility from a dedicated Amazon Appstore Birthday page that will display new deals daily as well as more of customers’ favorite apps. The Amazon Appstore also kicks off its Amazon Appstore for Android Birthday Giveaway and will award a Kindle Fire to eight lucky winners who enter the sweepstakes by March 31st.

Thank you for your partnership! We look forward to collaborating with you to bring customers great apps for another year!

Amazon is excited to announce an update to reports within the Amazon Appstore Developer Portal. Reports provide developers with important historical and trend data for sales and earnings. Improving the developer interface and strengthening service capability were two of the most important factors we focused on for this update.

During the past two months, we beta tested the update with more than 500 developers. Many of these developers provided valuable feedback that we incorporated into the final design. 

Starting today, we will begin rolling out this update to all developers on the Amazon Appstore Developer Portal.  You will notice the following changes:

• Infrastructure updates to enhance scalability and speed
• Enhanced sales and units reporting interface and navigation
• Streamlined earnings report with at-a-glance views of your monthly earnings statements
• Expanded selection of downloadable CSV reports

We encourage developers to explore the new reports and provide feedback via the Contact Us link on the Amazon Appstore Developer Portal homepage or by clicking on the Submit Feedback flag on your Reports page.

Interested in learning more about selling your apps on Amazon.com and Kindle Fire? Aaron Rubenson, director of the Amazon Appstore for Android, will offer insight at CES into how developers can get in front of millions of Amazon customers  – and make money – when they sell their apps at Amazon.com.

Learn about submitting apps for Kindle Fire,  which topped Amazon.com’s “Best of 2011” list as the best-selling, most wished for, and most gifted product as determined by Amazon.com customers. Throughout December, customers purchased well over 1 million Kindle devices per week. Also on the agenda is information about programs such as in-app purchasing and Test Drive, which lets customers try an app on their computers before they buy.

Rubenson and other Amazon Appstore representatives will be available for informal discussions after the presentation.

Who:  Aaron Rubenson, Director, Amazon Appstore for Android

What:  “Selling Apps on Amazon.com and Kindle Fire”

Where:  The Venetian Meeting Rooms, Veronese 2404

When:  Friday, January 13, 9 a.m. – no R.S.V.P. needed

Kindle Fire is a new addition to the Kindle family with a vibrant color touch display that offers  instant access to the Amazon Appstore, along with Amazon’s massive selection of digital content and free storage in the Amazon Cloud. A fast and powerful dual-core processor powers the 14.6-ounce device that’s light enough to hold with one hand—all for only $199.

Kindle Fire puts Amazon’s incredible selection of digital content at customers’ fingertips:

• Amazon Appstore for Android – thousands of popular apps and games
• 18 million movies, TV shows, songs, magazines, and books
• Ultra-fast web browsing - Amazon Silk 
• Free cloud storage for all your Amazon content
• Vibrant color touchscreen with extra-wide viewing angle  
• Fast, powerful dual-core processor 

Key features:

Stunning Color Touchscreen: Content comes alive on a 7” vibrant color touchscreen that delivers 16 million colors in high resolution and an extra-wide viewing angle.

Fast Dual-Core Processor: Kindle Fire features a state-of-the-art dual-core processor for fast, powerful performance. Stream music while browsing the web or read books while downloading videos.

Easy to Hold in One Hand: Designed to travel with you wherever you go. Light enough to hold in just one hand, Kindle Fire is perfect for browsing, playing, reading and shopping on-the-go.

Beautifully Simple and Easy To Use: Designed from the ground up, Kindle Fire's simple, intuitive interface lets customers spin effortlessly through your recent titles and websites straight from the home screen.

Free Cloud Storage: Kindle Fire gives you free storage for all Amazon digital content in the Amazon Cloud. Apps, books, movies, and music are available instantly to stream or download for free, at a touch of a finger. 

Ultra-fast web browsing – Amazon Silk: Amazon Silk is a revolutionary, cloud-accelerated browser that uses a "split browser" architecture to leverage the computing speed and power of the Amazon Web Services cloud. Learn why it’s so fast. 

Only $199: The all-new Kindle Fire is only $199. Customers in the U.S. can pre-order Kindle Fire starting today at www.amazon.com/kindlefire, and it ships Nov. 15, 2011.

Read more in the press release.

<p>We’d like to clear up some confusion about conflicting versions of our developer agreement. There are both PDF and plain text versions on our developer portal, and these versions didn’t agree. The PDF version was correct; the plain text version was old. This has now been fixed. The old plain text version was outdated and didn’t show the updates we made to the agreement last November, including that the definition of list price applies only to the app’s current price on a similar store. Thanks for making the store a success.</p>

You may have seen the buzz in Android blogs and forums about Amazon doing something… appy!  Today Amazon.com launched the Amazon Appstore Developer Portal.  You can find the Portal at developer.amazon.com.  It is a new self-service tool that allows mobile application developers—Android developers in particular—to join our Appstore Developer Program and submit apps for the upcoming launch of the Amazon Appstore for Android.

At Amazon, we start with the customer and work backwards, and we’re always looking for ways to improve the customer experience.  The sheer number of apps available today makes it hard for customers to find high-quality, relevant products – and developers similarly struggle to get their apps noticed.  Amazon’s innovative marketing and merchandising features are designed to help customers find and discover relevant products from our vast selection, and we’re excited to apply those capabilities to the apps market segment.

Our customers also have a strong interest in mobile, and across the company we are working hard to make our great products and services available on mobile devices. We continue to innovate the mobile shopping experience with the Amazon Shopping app, Amazon Price Check and the recently launched Windowshop for the iPad. We have numerous Kindle apps, and customers can shop our MP3 store from their mobile devices. Our subsidiaries like IMDB and Audible also have robust mobile applications.  An Appstore is a logical next step for Amazon in mobile. 

Why should you submit your apps for inclusion in the Amazon Appstore for Android?

• For the first time, you will have access to tens of millions of active Amazon customers.
• Amazon’s proven marketing and merchandizing features will help you get your apps discovered and in front of the right customers.
• The convenience of using an existing Amazon.com account will make it simple and easy for customers to purchase your apps - both online and on their mobile devices. 

The Appstore Developer Portal is your one-stop location to manage account details, manage marketing materials, and track sales and projected earnings using self-service and customizable reports.  We encourage you to check out the Portal at developer.amazon.com and join the Appstore Developer Program today! 

- The Amazon Appstore Team