Mobile Insiders

Since Apple opened up the App Store to developers two years ago, investors have sunk more than $100 million into 17 companies., according to figures reported by “the ChubbyBrain database,” which keeps a running tally of venture capital investments in the U.S.

I think its safe to say that mobile application offerings is a large factor when consumers are determining which device and carrier to go with. A study by Gravity Tank shows that iPhone and Android G1 owners have downloaded an average of 23.6 mobile applications to their smartphones and use an average of 6.8 apps each day. The survey also reports that 48 percent of smartphone owners shop for new applications more than once a week, and 49 percent say they use mobile apps for more than 30 minutes a day.

Despite the fact that the Pre is superior to the iPhone in some ways (mostly in the way of multithreading), time and time again shows that consumers reach for an iPhone. In fact, a survey taken lately shows that four out of ten current smartphone users who don't use an iPhone said they would switch to the Apple device for their next purchase, and four out of five iPhone owners said they would buy the phone again, according to a new study issued by market research firm Crowd Science. By comparison, just 14 percent of non-BlackBerry users told Crowd Science they would switch to a BlackBerry device for their next smartphone. The study notes that 71 percent of smartphone subscribers use their devices for both personal and business purposes, while only 3 percent use them for business only.

Today, the Apple App Store has more than 50,000 apps and more than 1 billion downloaded.  The biggest investors, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers’ $100 million iFund aimed at iPhone application developers, and RIM’s $150 million Blackberry Partners Fund created with Canadian firm JLA Ventures and the Royal Bank of Canada show that many more investments and interesting applications are on their way. Here are some interesting funding stats.

Breakdown of companies by industry: The top three areas of application investing falls into the categories of Social Networks (31 percent); Gaming and Entertainment (22 percent); and tied in third is SMS (13 percent) and diversified application development (13 percent).

Breakdown of money invested by industry: The top three areas of application investing by dollar amounts are Social Networks (27 percent); Gaming and Entertainment (22 percent); and Monitoring and Security (20 percent).

Average funding: The average level of funding was $4.7 million, the median was $3.5 million. The largest deal garnered $15.5 million, and the smallest deal received only $15,000. The most active VC was the iFund with six companies (in eight rounds) totaling $50 million.