Solana to Cripple App Store Dominance, Ultimate ‘Saga’ Game Plan Unveiled

Solana (SOL) co-founder, Anatoly Yakovenko has come out to share the protocol’s ultimate game plan for its Mobile phone Saga in the bid to break the dominance of Apple’s iOS Store and other centralized app service providers.

Solana Mobile and the Ultimate Game Plan

The development of Solana Mobile ‘Saga’ was first an ambitious move from the blockchain protocol considering it is a pioneering stride in the broader Web3.0 ecosystem. Rolled out earlier in the year, the initial enthusiasm soon died down as Apple and other high-end luxury brands debuted alternative options that seemed more attractive to users.

Taking to the X app, Yakovenko posited that plans are underway to break Apple’s duopoly through the creation of “a significant single-player benefit that outweighs the switching costs.”

What he meant by this was to create an attractive system for a significantly lower number of users who prioritize one or a few of the most important offerings that Solana Mobile boasts of. The observable feature the Solana founder pointed out is the Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) and associated innovations hosted on the protocol. 

The goal with @solanamobile is to crack the App Store duopoly.

Network effects are nearly impossible to overcome unless there's a significant single-player benefit that outweighs the switching costs.

We hypothesized that a sufficient number of NFT power users might prioritize…

— toly 🇺🇸 (@aeyakovenko) December 15, 2023

In his analysis, the high affinity of the hardcore Saga users bordering on network security will encourage developers to introduce more innovative protocols that can serve these niche users. The phone itself, despite its blockchain leanings will offer a boost as it charges no fee on transactions conducted on-chain.

“Once developers start releasing crypto-incentivized apps to all Saga users, it should kickstart the flywheel. Users interested in crypto incentives will adopt the phone, giving developers a concentrated distribution channel filled with users seeking those incentives, and all without any app fees,” the Solana founder says.

While he noted that competing with Apple is a difficult one, he said the first hurdle seems to have been crossed which is driving interest among users.

General Solana Ecosystem Trigger

The Solana Ecosystem is an interesting place to be at the moment as the bullish sentiment in the network is at its peak for now.

While Saga has recorded a massive jump in sales in recent times, BONK, the protocol’s first memecoin has hit a parabolic surge that has pushed it up the ranking as the third largest memecoin in the industry after Dogecoin (DOGE) and Shiba Inu (SHIB).

Solana is also entering its airdrop season beginning with the success of the Jito Network (JTO) airdrop that showed Solana is fully set for its ecosystem bull run. At the time of writing, Solana was trading at a price of $75.19, up by 0.53%.