China Mobile on Tuesday confirmed rumors and said it will launch a cellphone app store of its own before the end of 2009. The simply-titled Mobile Market will let third parties publish apps regardless of operating system through a single store on the carrier. Most details aren't known, though the store is being timed to launch with the government-backed TD-SCDMA standard for 3G, which should produce speeds fast enough to encourage downloading more apps.

Mobile Market is partly a response to the popularity of Apple's iPhone App Store and has also been considered a point of conflict preventing the iPhone from heading to China Mobile. With most details of negotiations kept a secret, the most frequent rumors suggest the provider either wants the rights to sell iPhone apps outside of iTunes or else to take a share of the revenues and control over what appears in the regular App Store.

In comparison, China Mobile has had relative freedom with Google's Android and plans to have devices using a custom version of the operating system; as Android apps don't have to be sold through an official Google app, they should be available through Mobile Market when the Lenovo OPhone and other Android devices are available.

Apple isn't known to have objected to the existence of the Mobile Market itself but has so far insisted that it have control over where and how apps are sold for iPhones. China Mobile's next-closest competitor, China Unicom, has also been in talks and may have fewer objections as well as an HSPA-based 3G network friendlier to Apple's usual plans.