Drivers who buy certain Chevrolet cars in the USA next year will be able to use Apple’s Siri voice-controlled assistant to activate vehicle features when driving.

The option will be available on Chevrolet Spark and Sonic models that include the Chevrolet MyLink infotainment system.

Total worldwide revenue collected by the mobile application market will pass $30 billion (around £19 billion) by the end of this year, according to ABI Research.

That’s the cumulative total from chargeable app downloads, in-app purchases, subscriptions and in-app advertisements - and it’s almost doubled since the end of last year.

Orange Vallée, the part of France Telecom-Orange responsible for innovation and development, has released a free cross-network mobile app that enables users to make free voice calls, send messages and receive voicemail messages.

It’s called Libon and is available as an iOS app in 90 countries including the UK; an Android version is planned for early next year.

The latest study from Strategy Analytics predicts that 350 billion mobile apps will be downloaded to smartphones and tablets between 2008 and 2017, with paid application downloads generating more than $57 billion worldwide.

However, free apps are expected to account for more than 91% of all downloads by 2017.

Tradedoubler says it’s become the first affiliate network to introduce a ‘performance marketing’ business model to the app market. Advertisers are able to track the number of app downloads generated by a publisher as well as tracking in-app sales and leads generated by mobile apps.

Affiliates can then be rewarded by being paid per acquisition, per lead or per installation.