CHARGING for something in the App store? Isn't this forbidden?

To me, this topic is not clear and I'd like to get a formal clarification by Garmin
.
.
.
Thanks Garmin for answering.

As a "customer" - I wholeheartedly agree - there needs to be some way to remunerate the developers or the ecosystem will die.

This is an evolving topic, and something we continue to discuss as we move forward.

Initially, we had planned the app "store" as a kind of repository or hosting service for app developers. We never intended to discourage monetization, but we didn't have any plan to facilitate it, either. If we allow apps to be purchased directly through the store, that means Garmin must handle payments, refunds, etc., as well as support purchases in store on mobile platforms through Garmin Connect Mobile.

Garmin is a business, so like all businesses we exist to make a profit. No profit = no business = no awesome jobs for me and my associates = no cool devices for customers. :) I think most folks understand this. Connect IQ does not generate a direct form a revenue for Garmin, and it's difficult to quantify just how much of an impact Connect IQ features have on device sales. I hope I'm being clear--I'm not trying to make it sound like Garmin isn't benefiting from the work developers do. Connect IQ and the apps all of our developer community has created add a lot of value to our devices. We just can't easily say for every device sold, $X can be attributed to Connect IQ.

If we handle payment processing (on mobile platforms in particular), we would have to pay a percentage to other companies like Apple and Google for the sale of apps we did not produce and on which we are making no direct revenue. That's a difficult thing to justify from a business perspective, and there are several other issues beyond payment processing that we'd have to address, too.

Hopefully this doesn't sound like a bunch of excuses--I just want to explain our position.

We're still looking at ways we can better support monetization through the store, and we have several ideas about it. Just the same, I encourage anyone that has suggestions to post them here. I can't guarantee that your ideas will be implemented, but we're willing to consider what developers have to say about this. Clearly, there's a desire to do more with the Connect IQ platform (which is really a good thing!), so we need to respond in the best way possible. I appreciate all of the interest in expanding monetization!

Brain fart follows - may not be entirely coherent :)

As (primarily) a customer to me the most comfortable path would be for the store to be Garmin-curated (ie. Garmin runs it, takes a reasonable (enough to cover the additional cost of payment processing - since you're already hosting the "free" store) percentage of the payment).

Pros: Updates etc can be handled automatically, customer sees Garmin as the seller so there should be no "fear of dealing with the unknown"
Cons: Either prices will have to be higher (so the developer gets the same fee) or developers will have to accept less.

However - if Garmin doesn't want to tread down that road there are alternatives:

1. An "official" store that is not affiliated to Garmin - rather a neutral collective of developers. They can build/run the store decide their own terms of engagement. Hopefully, it could be somehow integrated with the current store mechanism to handle app/field updates...
Pros: Nothing to do for Garmin
Cons: Hard to see it getting off the ground; Not "official"; Update handling manual

2. Free for all - developers allowed to do what they want
Pros: Developer sets his own rules
Cons: Fragmentation; potential lack of trust (who is JoeBlow on the Internet that I'm sending my $5 to?); Update handling

Thanks Brandon for your great reply.
And thanks AMRealHunnymonster for your reply, too.

Brandon, it's good to see Garmin is not against monetization.

Near future
You agree with me that devs can't have their apps currently monetized.

Solutions:
1. Device ID provided by Garmin Connect IQ framework -> works for Apps and Widgets to identify watches and activate the app over internet (requires some painful work from developers but OK)
2. Charging customers money in exchange for a .prg on an alternative market place. Only possibility for Watch Faces and Datafields, that don't have communication.

Current terms and conditions of the SDK are against solution #2, as it is stated that the SDK license does not allow anything else than developing for the Garmin Connect IQ store. Which means I can't sell my app outside the store, which means I can't sell my app at all.
If Garmin could update this part, saying that as long as the Garmin store doesn't support paid apps, developers are allowed to sell premium apps outside the store in the form of .prg. You can put conditions like, "as long as the basic app (which has at least 50% of the value of the paid app) is available on the Garmin store".
If you don't allow us to sell outside the store, then we'll be worried that you sue us for using the SDK in a way that's not allowed by the terms and conditions.

I have an idea right now of something to do with solution #2, but I'm not doing it only because of that T&C problem.

6-month future
Garmin, you guys are here to make money, like everyone. So run your numbers. Here's my proposal for a future Garmin store with paid apps:

Every Garmin user that downloads paid apps will have to set his payment information in the Garmin account. This way, you don't have to pay anything to Apple, this is just going through your own servers. (Or did I miss something in the T&C that says Apple will get a percentage of any transaction that happens through their apps? Regardless, the following still fully applies).

A user that wants to download a new paid app just goes in the Garmin Connect IQ store (just like today), select the app, [new step] validates payment "Confirm you're OK to pay $1 for this app", and the rest is the same.
Still supports updates, etc..

Garmin gets 30% of revenues on the app sales.

Calculate how many users own your Connect IQ watches, and assume 60% of them will at least spend $10 in apps to improve their expensive $300 to 600 investment. I don't have numbers, but I'll assume you sold 500,000 watches in one year, and so revenues of $5m would be generated by apps sales, and you'd have $1.5m in your pocket. This in itself justifies the investment in a paid store.

Considering your customer profile (pay more for better quality), I don't see why users wouldn't pay at least $10 to 20 per year to improve their watch. Just look at Apple and Android. Who doesn't buy apps to improve their phone or tablet?

You'd be positioning yourself as a true market place, ready to make this a revenue-generating platform for Garmin.

This will of course greatly improve the quality of contents, at this point, this will definitely attract users and developers alike.


Technical problem: you have to give developers the tools to make great apps. Coherent framework (right now, there's a bunch of small problems), more RAM to execute apps, more long-term storage (object store), perhaps wifi connectivity, a basemap (F3, D2B), list of airports (D2B) and courses/flight plans (in read/write) accessible from within the app.

When you have this, sales will definitely increase, because (talking about D2 Bravo) the watch will become compatible with other aviation apps that everyone uses, and therefore the watch will become useful. Right now, you're telling customers "buy the D2 Bravo, it does nothing you need". With custom apps, you'll be saying "buy the D2 Bravo, it has everything you need plus compatibility with your prefered aviation app"

All you need to do is get the framework straight, and make a paid market place. Then watch orders will increase to some extent, and you'll make additional money on the app store. Just look at Android and Apple.

If you disagree with this perspective, I would be very curious to understand what is the basis if your reasoning.
Thanks a lot for the discussion.

Hi Garmin,

To make it simple, while Garmin does not have a paid store, can developers:
- sell .PRGs outside the Garmin store?
- advertize their alternative site through their description/app?
- charge for app activation outside Garmin store once Device ID exists?

I would consider giving back to Garmin up to 15% of profits. (not revenues, because now developers have to support this infrastructure)

As soon as paid apps are supported in Garmin store, I'd be ready to sell exclusively through the Garmin store. In this case, I think Garmin could take up to 30% of revenues.


I'd need a confirmation in writing that this is allowed. I can request this officially with a letter to your legal department if necessary. Please let me know.

Thanks for your answer.

Depending on the numbers you pick, it's pretty easy to create a model that says "Monetization is a no brainer!" and "Monetization won't make money!". I can just as easily say "All users will buy $10 in apps x 1 M users = INSTANT $10 MILLION WITH 3 MILLION FOR GARMIN!" as say "25% of users will buy $2 in apps x 1 M users = $500K with 150K for Garmin!". One pays for itself, the other doesn't pay for one developer in the Bay Area, let alone the team required to build the system.

When CIQ was started the projections said building a monetization platform was a whole lot of risk to take on for a project whose foundation already included "Invent a new programming language". For those reasons we chose to go with a model more like launching a social network: Make CIQ apps free and then figure out how to make money later! We also thought that more developers would have partner phone apps - I mean what would they be able to do with *just* the wearable? - and could use phone app monetization over Garmin building a monetization platform.

So, I got a few things wrong in 2013, but that doesn't mean that even what we know now monetization is a no-brainer. For those of us without our own phone platform the purchase experience for the customer on mobile is much more difficult (unless you want us to give a cut to Apple/Google). We also need things like a better security infrastructure to protect paid apps from being shared, a e-commerce back end, developer royalty system, etc.

All that said. we know that we want to give our developer community incentives for writing good apps, and we are trying to find the ways to do that. We may take some approaches that are new and different than the *traditional* monetized app store approach at first, but we do recognize giving you more reasons to make good content will only look better for us.

Hi AlphaMonkeyC,

Thanks a lot for your reply.

I can see how creating a monetization platform carries a lot of risk for Garmin, and why it's necessary to really look into all different possibilities and get experience before making an investment decision. Also, I didn't have any real numbers so I was just trying to get a sense of the scale by making these multiplications.

That being said, developers and users are interested in improving the watches now, not in 1 or 2 years. As a user, I paid 700€ in July for the D2 Bravo which is a joke compared to the original D2. It's a watch that can't be used for its announced purpose of being a navigation backup. But I still want to bring it to its full capabilities, and it's possible via ConnectIQ. All I am requesting at this point is for Garmin to authorize off-Garmin-platform / third party charging for apps (developers will figure out a way), as this is currently not authorized in the SDK license. And this, only as long as there are no other options provided by Garmin.

I'm not a developer. I'm just a sales guy. But I want my watch to work the way I expect. I and many others are ready to do Garmin's job in developing the apps to bring watches on par with expectations (I'm really talking about the D2 Bravo now). That will require a lot of time and effort, and I'm just asking Garmin to authorize making money from it to compensate for the cost. I'm fine with giving you x% on the profits.

If this is not possible, is there a reason why?

Julienvm, it feels like your trying to speak for the entire developer community, so I'd like to give you my look at things.

I'm developing CIQ apps. It's a hobby and I have a lot of fun creating the apps. I think it's a bonus to be able to upload the apps to the store and I'm happy when other decide to download my apps and use then.
I have a whole backlog of app ideas for which I hope I'll have the time to write them all. Some of them will require a webservice or a companion app. I don't think I'll ever charge money for any of my apps.

If, however, I were to decide to make money with my hobby, I know I'd have a lot of options already. I could focus on apps that require a webservice and have people pay for an account or I could sell a required companion app. I could even create just one simple companion app purely for having users pay for activation of the app they downloaded from the store.

To my opinion, having a second app store is a terrible idea.

To my opinion, having a second app store is a terrible idea.

I agree 100%!

There are things I'd like to see changed in the current app store, like maybe being able to easily provide a manual for complex apps (without placing them elsewhere in a "cloud"), and maybe a way for developers to add responses to reviews right in the store, but that's about it.