Telecom Italia has announced the opening of its mobile apps store, called TIM Store, while also stating that it is working with Telefonica in a project referred to as the Common Applications Marketplace. The intention is to integrate the TIM Store with the app stores of Telefonica’s Movistar (Spain) and O2 businesses in Europe, to create a single presence with a potential audience of some 70 million customers. As with other operator stores, the TIM offering is platform-independent, offering products for a range of smartphone platforms and supporting Java for feature phone owners.

The TIM store has been “conceived to boost the Italian market for applications designed specifically to meet the needs of Italian consumers, and to foster the international growth of Italian-made digital products and services.” The operator already has a catalogue of “a thousand or so” apps, for Android, BlackBerry, Java, Symbian and Windows Mobile platforms, with operator billing available. It says that MeeGo and other OSs will be supported in the future. It has not been stated if this includes support for apps built using the widget technology being endorsed by the Wholesale Applications Community, of which both Telefonica and Telecom Italia are members, although this would certainly seem a logical step forward.