The Epic Games Store will be pre-installed on Telefónica phones running Android

The Epic Games Store comes pre-installed on compatible Android phones from the Telefónica network in Spain, the UK, Germany, Mexico and all Spanish-speaking countries in Latin America as part of a new partnership between the service provider and Epic Games.

Telefonica’s Director of Partnerships and Entities, Lorena Senador-Gómez, commented: “With this collaboration with Epic Games, we strengthen our relationship and go one step further in delivering high-quality, accessible and innovative digital experiences to our customers.”

Michael Modon, Senior Director of Growth Partnerships for Epic Games, said: “Thanks to our partnership with Telefonica, players will now be able to access the Epic Games Store and Fortnite directly on their Android devices. We look forward to expanding our partnership with Telefonica to give players even more benefits.”

Epic Games, famously, has been at loggerheads with Google and Apple for several years at this point regarding opening up their ecosystems to third-party stores and payment processing. Legal efforts in this direction have partially borne fruit, although the real breakthrough for Epic came in the form of regulation from the European Union this year – which Apple still tried to block.

A statement from Epic Games on social media couldn’t resist throwing a little shade at Google regarding this new partnership.

“Epic Games Store will now be pre-installed on Telefónica Android devices in Spain, UK, Germany, Mexico and Spanish-speaking Latam,” the post says. “This will allow players to bypass many of Google’s misleading scare screens and get to playing Fortnite faster. We’re looking to partner with other companies as we continue to fight to open up the mobile ecosystem to competition.”

Tim Sweeney’s big dream of making the Epic Games Store a staple on as many devices as possible has taken a big step forward today.