Thursday’s Apple Rumors — Android’s App-etite

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InvestorPlace
Here are your Apple rumors and news items for Thursday: Champ on the Way: A report from research group Distimo reprinted at All Things Digital says Google’s (NASDAQ: GOOG ) Android Market will become the world’s largest app store by the end of the year, with its number of downloadable apps finally outstripping Apple’s (NASDAQ: AAPL ). This, of course, assumes Apple’s app-store growth won’t get a spike after it updates its mobile operating system later this year. Regardless, the report demonstrates that Research In Motion (NASDAQ: RIMM ), Nokia (NYSE: NOK ), Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT ), and even app players like Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN ) will need to pick up the pace in order to catch up with Google and Apple’s outlets. Verizon iPhone Drops Off: A Thursday report at DigiTimes suggests that Verizon (NYSE: VZ ) iPhone sales have fallen off significantly in the second quarter. Pegatron, a company that assembles iPhones, reported a loss of more than $19 million for the first quarter of the year, due to smaller-than-expected orders for Verizon’s version of the iPhone. The company was expecting to ship 10 million of the newer models by the end of the year, but that shrunk to 5 million, as of April. Apple has said Verizon activated 2.2 million iPhones since the device was released in February during its quarterly earnings call. It’s unclear whether the Verizon iPhone’s underperformance has been caused by too small of a release (the phone has yet to be released on other 3G networks around the world) or if Verizon customers are simply holding off a purchase in favor of a much-rumored 4G iPhone due later this year. Apple Gets Fit: An Apple patent application detailed by AppleInsider in a Thursday report indicates a plan by the company to help its legions of iPad and iPhone users trim down in the near future. The patent titled “Systems and Methods for Accessing Personalized Fitness Services Using a Portable Electronic Device” describes an app that would transform Apple mobile devices into a personal trainer. The app will schedule workout sessions, lay out eating plans, locate nearby gyms using GPS, and provide charts for progress tracking. Features will be broken into categories like “New Customers,” “Getting There,” “In the Gym,” and “Post Workout.” With a new version of Apple’s personal and office services software suite MobileMe expected to be released this fall alongside the new iPhone, a new fitness program seems like a perfect fit for the service. As of this writing, Anthony John Agnello did not own a position in any of the stocks named here. Follow him on Twitter at  @ajohnagnello  and  become a fan of  InvestorPlace on Facebook.