Apple pays $1.3 billion to keep iTunes and AppStore running

[iDan]

Did you ever think it was an easy job to manage the world’s biggest virtual stores and offer users the chance to purchase their favorite music, apps, films, book etc.? Think again!

Apple’s virtual stores generate billions of downloads every month but the company spends millions of dollars to keep them running.

The AppStore and iTunes are literally cash cows for Apple, generating monthly revenues of $ 313 million, but the company spends $113 million to pay for the stores’ maintenance services. This means paying for servers, for the payment systems from the iTunes, in other words for every element that is essential for the running of its virtual stores.
Apple pays $1.3 billion dollars every year to keep the AppStore and the iTunes running day and night. The figure may seem astronomical, but the expenditure is justified by the huge number of downloads they generate.

Customers have downloaded 15 billion songs, 14 billion apps and 130 million books, Apple Insider reported. The Cupertino-based company revealed during WWDC 2011 that its data base comprises no less than 225 million iTunes account for the over 200 million Apple products the tech giant has sold. Most accounts possess a card which is used by iOS device owners to purchase apps or music from the iTunes.

Apple’s iTunes is the world’s largest virtual music and video store. The company is constantly investing money into extending the storage capacity of its stores. For example, the tech giant ordered 12 petabytes of storage from Isilon Systems in April.

By Radu Tyrsina
Source: Apple Insider