Ovi’s global explosion

ESPOO, Finland – With the number of active Nokia service users now approaching 140 million users worldwide, Ovi is making pretty good progress. What’s more, 200,000 new users are signing up to Ovi daily and Ovi Store downloads are now topping 2.3 million per day (that’s 300k more than a couple of weeks ago). Oh, and if that’s not enough numbers for ya, 70 developers have each passed 1 million or more downloads on Ovi Store. Not bad, really.

Ovi is now available in 190 countries around the world and offers users access to Maps, Music, Messaging, Apps and Ovi Life Tools. In India, China and Indonesia, more than 4.7 million people now subscribe to Ovi Life Tools. Ovi Mail and Ovi Chat now have more than 17 million users whilst Ovi Music packs a whopping 11 million tracks across 38 countries.

The every day usage of Ovi Maps is the staggering equivalent of driving around the world 80 times. We’re not sure which direction, though.

For developers considering creating apps for Ovi Store (and having a stab at that $10 million prize fund) the numbers are even more staggering. Herocraft, which publishes games such as Farm Frenzy has seen over 10 million downloads from Ovi Store whilst Offscreen, which publishes a range of touchscreen apps, has seen more than 45 million downloads.

Tero Ojanpera, executive vice president, Nokia services said:

“At Nokia, we believe that connecting people with great mobile experiences is at the heart of what Ovi is all about. Today people discover Ovi through Maps, Music, Messaging, Ovi Store and Ovi Lifetools. With a new generation of amazing devices, like the Nokia N8, developers are looking at Ovi as a good business decision and a chance to innovate and create next-generation mobile experiences for our family of new Symbian devices.”

Check out the list below to find out more about some of the developers who have broken the 1 million download record on Ovi Store. We’ll be profiling more of them over the coming weeks and months right here on Conversations. If you’re a developer, or thinking about creating an app, then you’ll learn a lot from these guys. If you’re a user, then check out their apps if you haven’t already got them on your device.

It’s been a heck of a year for Ovi and these numbers are testament to the hard work everyone in the Ovi team has been putting in to make each and every service better and better. We recently saw a new upgrade for Maps and for those receiving their brand new Nokia N8s today and over the coming weeks, they can look forward to an all-new Ovi Store, too.
Some of Ovi Store’s success stories

Fringland Ltd – Israel
The first mobile VoIP app ever developed for Skype, Twitter and VoIP on Symbian, fring is a free “social hub” for a broad range of Nokia Series 40 and Nokia Symbian devices featuring free calling, live chat, and integrated access to a variety of social networking services. As of December 15, 2009, fring had been downloaded over 300,000 times.
Read more about fringland.
Download Fring

HeroCraft – Kaliningrad, Russia
Farm Frenzy is a mobile game that takes you out of crazy city life and plunges you into the country to manage a full working farm. Originally released in 2007 for the PC, Farm Frenzy was brought to Ovi Store in September 2009 and has been downloaded over six million times in over 200 countries.
Read more about HeroCraft
Download FarmFrenzy

Idevio AB – Göteborg, Sweden
Locago, an exciting new map browser app that features directions, multiple information layer overlays, and real-time dynamic content updates has found worldwide success through Nokia’s Ovi Store. The app, which was developed by the mapping and geocoding experts at Idevio AB has been downloaded over two million times in more than 200 countries.
Read more about Locago
Download Locago

innerActive – Tel Aviv. Israel
InnerActive is an in-game and in-application optimization platform for text and banner ads on the full range of Nokia devices, from the Series 40 to the latest Nokia Symbian touchscreen devices. InnerActive offers mobile developers greater freedom to release free, ad-funded content, a strategy proven to increase downloads.
Read more about innerActive

Lunaforte – Hoorn, Netherlands
Lunaforte (a.k.a. Lunagames) creates fun mobile apps and casual games with community features. But they’re not playing around when it comes to expanding their presence, having already published more than 20 free, ad-supported and premium applications through the Ovi Store that have been downloaded over six million times in over 200 countries.
Read more about Lunaforte
Download Lunaforte

Nimbuzz – Capelle aan den Ijssel, Netherlands
The newly upgraded Nimbuzz mobile app for Nokia Symbian devices, a social networking client with more than 10 million registered users across all mobile platforms, with over 600,000 downloads from Ovi Store integrates a complete range of popular voice and text messaging services and networking protocols into a single interface.
Read more about Nimbuzz
Download Nimbuzz

Numo AS – Oslo, Norway
In its first two months of being available in Ovi Store, over 600,000 users discovered the simplicity and convenience of SMS Preview, a user-friendly text-messaging solution by Numo Solutions based in Oslo, Norway and Espoo, Finland.
Read more about SMS Preview
Download SMS Preview

Offscreen – Helsinki, Finland
Offscreen Technologies, specializing in high quality touch-optimized apps for Symbian and Maemo touch devices, is a prolific developer with over 50 apps, games and ebooks on the Ovi Store to date. The response from consumers has been overwhelmingly positive, with titles downloaded more than 34 million times in over 200 countries.
Read more about Offscreen Technologies
Download Offscreen Technologies games

Polarbit AB – Stockholm, Sweden
Polarbit has a game you’ll love, whether you prefer the role of a lone commando fighting against hordes of enemy soldiers, a pilot engaging in thrilling dogfights thousands of feet in the air or a speedboat captain racing through beautiful scenery at a breakneck pace. A dedication to quality gameplay coupled with years of industry experience has led to the release of five titles on the Ovi Store, with over one million total downloads to date.
Read more about Polarbit
Download Polarbit games

Ravensoft Ltd – Manchester, United Kingdom
Ravensoft, the company behind popular utility and communication apps Battery Extender and Tweets60, has achieved unprecedented worldwide reach through the Ovi Store, receiving over 1.5 million downloads from consumers in 200+ countries.
Read more about Ravensoft
Download Ravensoft apps

Shazam Entertainment Ltd. – London, United Kingdom
Shazam gives consumers instant satisfaction in those times when they want to know the name of the song that is playing. It allows consumers to discover new music, learn about the artist, get chart information, music recommendations, buy the song and share their discovery with their family and friends via mobile, Facebook or Twitter. Shortly after launch in Ovi Store, Shazam doubled the amount of countries they were in from 60 to over 120.
Read more about Shazam
Download Shazam

Syntonetic Media Solutions – Frederiksberg, Denmark
Playlist DJ is an indispensable tool for mobile music lovers everywhere – creating instant, randomized playlists based on users’ moods or favorite songs. More than 25 million songs have been profiled for use by the app and Playlist DJ has been downloaded by over one million users in 200 different countries, from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, since September 2009.
Read more about Playlist DJ
Download Playlist DJ

MMMOOO – Shanghai, China
MMMOOO, owned by Shanghai Jibiao Info Tech Co., Ltd., is the number one apps themeprovider worldwide and provides themesand apps to enrich mobile phones and make the devices more useful andenjoyable. Part of the Ovi Store since May 2009, the company hassteadily expanded its offerings to include a variety of themes andapps which have been downloaded over 4.6 million times.
Read more about MMMOOO
Download MMMOOO