On November 27th, Business of Apps Berlin 2025 (formerly App Promotion Summit Berlin) gathered over 700 app marketing, growth, product, CRM, and revenue leaders at the Hotel Adlon for a day of learning and networking. The event, in its twelfth iteration, marked a new attendance record and was the last to be held at the iconic hotel in Berlin’s Mitte district.
From APS to BOA: Twelve years of bringing the app industry together
It all began back in 2013. The app industry was young — practically a newborn. It was still the stuff of nerds and geeks. Brands and businesses had to be convinced of mobile’s value. Back then the rules of the game were downloads and installs. To succeed, one needed more users, with most spending going towards UA.
That year, the first App Promotion Summit Berlin took place. Gathering around 200 people, most discussions revolved around advertising and UA optimisation.
The name App Promotion Summit made sense back then.
From there, APS began growing and expanding. The app industry was doing the same — diversifying, maturing. Specialised agencies began popping up, and with increased scrutiny and oversight from governments and users’ demands for privacy and personalisation, things began shifting.
Pretty soon, UA alone was only half the story. Acquiring users became more expensive and more difficult. Apps could no longer afford to acquire a new user and throw them in at the deep end without thinking about onboarding, notification permissions, messaging strategies, subscription management, and a thousand other etceteras that are the cornerstone of any app growth strategy worth its mettle.
App growth today… well, it’s not an easy thing. It’s full-funnel, consisting of multiple layers, each complex in its own right, that app marketers must tame into peaceful co-operation if they are to stand a chance in today’s dog-eat-dog mobile world.
APS… well, it changed too.
For one, the numbers have septupled (means to increase sevenfold 😉). The last event’s audience, which took place just over a week ago, consisted of CMOs, CPOs, growth leaders, product managers, and founders from some of the world’s biggest apps.
The one-room gatherings of the early years are now large-scale events with exhibitions, meeting programmes, and multi-track content, spanning user acquisition, retention, monetisation, subscriptions, and product development.
App Promotion Summit no longer makes as much sense these days…
The Hotel Adlon, despite its unimpeachable Glanz und Eleganz, can barely contain our crowd within its walls…
The road ahead
For starters, we changed our name. We are now Business of Apps and we’ve been so for a while. You can learn more about the rebrand here.
After twelve amazing years at the Adlon, we’ve grown too big and we are moving.
We will, of course, miss the Adlon. The hotel was APS for twelve whole years, APS was the hotel. However, to welcome even more curious, knowledge-hungry attendees and deliver on our promise of bigger, better events, we must move.
Next year, November 12th (pencil in the date now so you don’t forget), we will be welcoming you at the Estrel Congress Center, “one of Berlin ’s largest and most modern conference, trade fair and event locations” (it’s says so on the home page of their website — let’s pause for a second to laud my research skills 😀).
In all seriousness now, it’s an outstanding venue, in the hip, young, and vibrant Neukölln district. It will also let us welcome a bigger — did anyone say 1,000+?! — audience and up our production values to the max.
It’s a change, yes, and change can be scary, especially in uncertain times, but — platitude incoming — with changes comes opportunity.
The app industry has been growing, changing, expanding, diversifying, maturing. Along with the rebrand, this is our way of keeping pace with an dynamic market that rarely sleeps… is over-caffeinated… and is tweaking onboarding flows and researching keywords at 2am in the morning — but who am I to judge?!
A few things that are not changing are our mission and our team. We are still focused on connecting and growing the app industry, delivering outstanding events, and being the leading source of information on the app industry.
As always, everyone is more than welcome. We hope to see you there. More information can be found here.
