Distimo

Distimo, founded in 2009 in The Netherlands by four individuals including Vincent Hoogsteder who served as CEO, established itself as a key player in the nascent mobile app analytics market. The firm's core objective was to bring transparency to the rapidly growing app ecosystem by providing developers with actionable metrics.

The company operated on a freemium business model, offering a free app analytics platform for developers to track crucial data such as downloads, revenue, and campaign conversions across multiple app stores without needing to implement additional code. This free service enabled Distimo to aggregate vast amounts of data, which in turn powered its premium, paid solution, AppIQ. AppIQ was a market intelligence tool designed for developers and financial services companies, providing daily competitive data, download and revenue estimations, and analysis of market share and competitor performance. Revenue for the company was generated from these premium offerings, which were sold to larger entities like mobile operators and handset manufacturers who could afford detailed market intelligence.

Distimo's platform was recognized for its ability to provide a centralized dashboard to monitor an application's performance across all major app stores, including Apple, Android, Blackberry, and others. The service allowed clients to track events like price changes and their impact on download numbers, offering a comprehensive view of their competitive landscape.

A significant milestone in the company's history occurred in May 2014 when it was acquired by its larger competitor, App Annie. The acquisition, made for an undisclosed sum of cash and stock, was a strategic move by App Annie to consolidate the market, accelerate its product roadmap, and establish a strong European R&D center in Distimo's Netherlands headquarters. Following the acquisition, Distimo's founders and team were integrated into App Annie, with Vincent Hoogsteder and others taking on key roles within the merged entity. The combined companies served nearly 270,000 registered business users at the time of the merger.

Keywords: mobile app analytics, app store data, market intelligence, AppIQ, Vincent Hoogsteder, App Annie acquisition, app revenue tracking, app download tracking, competitive analysis, freemium analytics, mobile market data, developer tools, conversion tracking, app store optimization, ASO, cross-platform analytics, mobile strategy, application performance, data aggregation, Netherlands tech