Amazon Underground has tripled Rovio’s Amazon Appstore revenue

Retailer Amazon has said that developers who have signed up to its Amazon Underground ecosystem are enjoying a surge in revenues.

Specifically, Angry Birds developer Rovio has seen revenues from the Amazon Appstore triple since launching four games on the service while Jetpack Joyride and Fruit Ninja creators Halfbrick have seen revenues and game downloads double.

We included four of our popular titles in Amazon Underground at launch, aimed at reaching as many fans as possible in the Amazon ecosystem,” Rovio’s SVP of game business Tero Raji said.

In the first month since launch of these games, the Amazon Underground model has brought us up to three times more revenue compared to the same games’ user revenue in the Amazon Appstore previously.”

Halfbrick’s CEO Shainiel Deo added: We’ve been thrilled with the performance of Jetpack Joyride and Fruit Ninja as part of the Amazon Underground programme in the month since launch.

Thus far we have doubled the downloads and revenue from our apps in the Amazon Appstore and most interestingly, customers are engaging with our in-app purchase content within our games at an extremely high rate. Since all in-app purchases are free in Amazon Underground, they can play the games in new and exciting ways.”

Amazon launched its Underground app in August. It offers free versions of titles that would otherwise demand an up-front payment or in-app purchases. Under the scheme, Amazon pays the developers on a per-minute basis according to how long gamers play.

In its first two months of availability Amazon has tripled the number of apps available on the service.

"It’s always been our aim with Monument Valley to create a meaningful experience for all types of players,” Monument Valley’s executive producer Dan Gray added. It’s great that there’s now a service in Amazon Underground that lets us reach millions of people that wouldn’t usually pay for games, without compromising the game design or its principles."