Beyond profit, here's why the iPhone is really winning for game developers.

TechCrunch just published a very interesting analysis of the iPhone market:

The iPhone Actually Has No Competition Where It Matters Most 

To sum this up: 

Apple now makes more revenue in the mobile space than all of their competitors. This list includes HTC, RIM, LG, Sony-Ericsson, Samsung Motorola, and Nokia.  Apple captured two thirds of available mobile phone profits in Q2.  Apple now controls over 66 percent of all the profits amongst the major players in the mobile space. HTC, RIM, LG, Sony-Ericsson, Samsung Motorola, and Nokia combined for the other 33 or so percent of profits in the space. 

But here's the more important statistic:

Apple had 87.2% of the application revenue share in 2010 (IHS Screen Digest).  Android is catching up in terms of application downloads, but actual revenue continues to lag.  In our own experience, paid Android games have earned less than even advertising supported versions running low revenue ad units.

Why is this so? 

Apple's advantage is all those iTunes accounts.  When the app store launched, users could purchase apps from day one.  On Android they had to sign up for Google Checkout and users were reluctant to do so.  Big app success from day one (iShoot as an example) motivated developers to create a large number of titles.  

Will this change?

I personally see Google Plus as the wildcard in all of this.  If it continues it's rapid growth and if Google enables games for the platform, that could drive adoptation of Google Checkout and the new in-app purchasing systems.  This naturally could spill over into the Android App Market.