Epic-Apple trial hangs over some 50,000 games on App Store

In his testimony Monday as Apple’s first witness in federal court in Oakland, California, Schiller was called on by his company’s lawyers to exhaustively defend store policies Epic attacked during the first two weeks that Rogers has been hearing evidence without a jury. — Bloomberg

About 47,600 games are featured on Apple Inc’s App Store under the same “freemium” model used by Fortnite, according to court testimony from a senior executive at the iPhone maker, signalling that the outcome of a lawsuit brought by Epic Games Inc could have broad ramifications for other game developers.

Phil Schiller, Apple Fellow and former senior vice president of worldwide marketing, disclosed Monday that 17% of the 280,000 games on the App Store are classified as freemium, meaning the games are free to download but include in-app paid upgrades. That’s the category of game Fortnite is in. The ongoing trial stems from Apple’s removal of Fortnite from the App Store after Epic tried to replace Apple’s in-app-purchase system – which takes a cut up to 30% – with its own in-house payment solution.