Samsung plans to launch a mobile application store in Europe this quarter, following an increasingly popular path to revenue inspired by Apple's iPhone App Store.
The handset maker opened a beta version of its application store in the U.K. early this year, but it will launch and expand an official version in Europe this quarter, Samsung said in a statement Wednesday.
Samsung will join Nokia and Apple in offering application download stores for their handsets. Mobile carriers including Verizon and China Mobile plan to open application stores as well, and Google has adopted the business model with its Android Market, which offers applications for phones with the operating system. Microsoft officially opened its Windows Marketplace for Mobile download store to software developers this week.
Samsung will launch its own Web portal for application developers, who will be able to submit apps and purchase a sales contract on the site. The site will be open to developers of applications for the Windows Mobile or Symbian operating systems.
Samsung's beta store already offers paid and free application downloads. Its two most popular applications, a PC synchronizing application for Windows Mobile and a video player for Symbian, both have over 180,000 downloads, according to the store Web site.