[December 27, 2011]

Chomp Leads in App Search During Move to 'Appification'

During a year that solidified the move from the traditional web to mobile, Chomp, the leading app search engine, signed influential partnerships and released products that reflected the growing importance of the app ecosystem. As apps surpass a billion downloads every month and app revenue exceeds $15 billion¹, app search and discovery becomes essential to user experience and developer profitability. During 2011 Chomp became the app search engine for Verizon Wireless (News - Alert) stores and phones, pioneered app advertising with Chomp Search Ads, and secured a team of renowned search scientists that will allow the company to continue to lead in app search technology development in 2012.

In September, Verizon Wireless and Chomp announced that Chomp's app search engine will power all searches on Android™ smartphones at the end of 2011. The team at Verizon's Application Innovation Center researched app search provider alternatives and found that Chomp app search delivered superior app search results. Chomp was also one of two companies chosen to represent a model partnership in the launch of the Verizon Application Innovation Center in August, a facility where developers, network engineers and mobile industry entrepreneurs collaborate on applications designed for 3G and 4G LTE (News - Alert) networks. In May, the two companies announced the first step in helping app discovery for Verizon Wireless customers when the Chomp app was made available in V CAST Apps, allowing Verizon Wireless customers to search for apps across V CAST Apps and Android Market™ at the same time.

Chomp also began pioneering app search advertising with the availability of Chomp Search Ads in September. The new program, which is currently in private beta, allows developers for the first time, to bid on keywords or phrases which will deliver their ads when uses search on those terms within an app search engine. Chomp Search Ads is the only way to match app ads to the most relevant potential customer, resulting in quality ad matching for both the advertiser and the consumer. Prior to Chomp Search Ads, advertisers could only buy app display or performance advertising; a process that didn't allow developers to serve ads that matched what the user was actually searching for. According to Gartner Group, $893 million was spent on app advertising in 2010. With over 200 million iOS and Android users looking for apps each month, developers are spending 20-30% of total app revenue they generate on trying to acquire new users through various advertising and marketing initiatives.

In August, Chomp announced that two prominent scientists had joined the company as technology advisors - Dr. David Blei, a Princeton University assistant professor and machine learning expert, and Dr. Don Metzler, a USC assistant research professor, Information Sciences Institute computer scientist and information retrieval expert. Drs. Blei and Metzler join Chomp to further strengthen the company's technology lead in app search. They work directly with CTO, co-founder and app search innovator, Cathy Edwards, and the Chomp team of PhDs and scientists from Berkeley, MIT and Google (News - Alert).

"It has been an exciting and successful year for Chomp to say the least," says Ben Keighran, CEO. "As we move into the New Year and continue to experience the 'appification' of the web, app search has more significance than ever. At Chomp, we pride ourselves on providing the best, most relevant search results; we have a lot in store for 2012 in our continued efforts to alleviate app overload."

In February, Chomp launched on Android devices, and in September, a new version of their iPhone app was released with a completely redesigned user interface. Twitter recognized Chomp for its Twitter integration on iOS, which allows user to find apps that use Twitter, sign into Chomp with their Twitter account, and tweet reviews to followers.

Chomp releases a monthly app search report that analyzes search queries and provides insight into trends occurring among smarthphone users.

About Chomp, Inc.

Founded in 2009 by Ben Keighran and Cathy Edwards, Chomp, Inc. is the only company to enable app search based on what an app actually does. One billion apps are being downloaded every month. As the number of apps explode, it's become difficult for users to find the perfect app based on what they want to do. Chomp's patent-pending algorithm is able to understand what an app does and what a user wants and makes the best match. Chomp also allows developers to effectively integrate app search into their content. Chomp powers search for a wide range of partners including Verizon, Carphone Warehouse (News - Alert), Blekko, 148Apps.com and @aplusk. The company is funded by leading Silicon Valley investors, including Ron Conway, BlueRun Ventures as well as a number of ex-Google angel investors. The company is based in San Francisco, CA (News - Alert) and can be found at www.chomp.com.

¹ Statistics as reported by TechCrunch

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