HP, Dell developing Microsoft Smartphones

[Jason Dunn]

"Both Dell and Hewlett Packard appear to be making forays into the Microsoft Smartphone arena. A report said that both companies have asked a number of Taiwanese manufacturers to give them quotes for phones, said Digitimes. Those include HTC – which makes the Orange slow booter, Mitac, Compal, Asustek, Quanta and Inventec, the newspaper claimed. But it's unclear whether these companies would accept quotations to make Smartphones, given the low price tag on these devices."

The importance and long-range impact of news like this can't be underestimated - it's key to Microsoft's attack on the phone market. Microsoft has commoditized the market, very much in the same what they did with the PC, drastically reducing the time and resources it takes to bring a phone to market. Nokia isn't just going to be competing against Orange and other carriers - they'll be up against anyone with a brand and the desire to make a phone. Today that might be HP and Dell. Tomorrow it might be the Chicago Bulls and Burger King. Think it sounds crazy? Just wait and see what happens over the next 24 months...

[Jason Dunn]

"Both Dell and Hewlett Packard appear to be making forays into the Microsoft Smartphone arena. A report said that both companies have asked a number of Taiwanese manufacturers to give them quotes for phones, said Digitimes. Those include HTC – which makes the Orange slow booter, Mitac, Compal, Asustek, Quanta and Inventec, the newspaper claimed. But it's unclear whether these companies would accept quotations to make Smartphones, given the low price tag on these devices."

The importance and long-range impact of news like this can't be underestimated - it's key to Microsoft's attack on the phone market. Microsoft has commoditized the market, very much in the same what they did with the PC, drastically reducing the time and resources it takes to bring a phone to market. Nokia isn't just going to be competing against Orange and other carriers - they'll be up against anyone with a brand and the desire to make a phone. Today that might be HP and Dell. Tomorrow it might be the Chicago Bulls and Burger King. Think it sounds crazy? Just wait and see what happens over the next 24 months...

[heov]

hmm... next 24 months, eh?

when will we see any smartphone 2k2 in the US? None of our local carierrs have them yet here (verizon, sprint, cingular, and tmobile).

I have a lot of hope for the smartphone platform (ms smartphone that is), but i just don't see this sector of the market where MS will dominate, especially in just 2 years.

i mean, the same thing happened w/ PPC 3 years ago (april 1st i believe it was when ms announced ppc; was there a post on that - 3 years birthday ) everyone said it'll take over the market by now, and although PPC grew at an incredible rate, it never caught up to palm yet... and at the rate sony and palm or developing, and lowering their prices, i don't think PPC is going to catch them... yet they will stay @ their current status... but who knows. Maybe palm sg will go out of business and palm source will be bought by sony.

Another thing that we should consider besides symbian in the smartphone market is palm. There are quite a few smartphones and wireless/always on devices that use palm os, but i personally don't see that going anywhere.

And to conclude, i've got a question is there a Smartphone FAQ thing out there w/ an overview and stuff besides the MS site and CEWindows.net? Thanks!

[NeilE]

You will see Smartphones in North America this year. I can't say specific timelines, but definitely this year.

If you're interested in an FAQ about the software itself I wrote one for Club Smartphone, although it's probably only useful if you have a phone: http://www.microsoft.com/mobile/smar...rt/spfaqeu.asp. There are a ton of fan sites out for Smartphone, a list is available at the bottom of http://www.microsoft.com/mobile/smar...ks/default.asp.

You might want to check out some of the Smartphone MVP sites: www.coolsmartphone.com, www.modaco.com and www.smartphony.org.

Hope this helps!

[Seraph1024]

They can make all the phones they want. With the mindframe of the US consumers, they will never hit as nice as the rest of the world.

Reason: People what the cheapest stuff in the US. They don't care about the quality or the benifits. If it is free, we'll take it.



L

[ricksfiona]

Originally Posted by Seraph1024

They can make all the phones they want. With the mindframe of the US consumers, they will never hit as nice as the rest of the world.

Reason: People what the cheapest stuff in the US. They don't care about the quality or the benifits. If it is free, we'll take it.



L

Oh yeah. Sad, but true.

I'm glad the bigger companies are finally jumping into the scene. Let's see if we can get one of these companies to include Bluetooth into their future Smartphones!

[ARW]

Originally Posted by NeilE

You will see Smartphones in North America this year. I can't say specific timelines, but definitely this year.

But will there be one for CDMA, specifically for Verizon?

Trying to resist the Kyo 7135...must not give in to temptation...

[PhatCohiba]

I'd have to agree with Jason. What a MS smartphone will do is provide greater features at a lower pricepoint. As we've seen with the Dell PPC.

Dell doesn't have to write system software and can pay ms a license, focus only on low price hardware and a streamlined distribution channel.

If you're a carrier, which model do you like:

a) subsidizing phones sales, where the phone are now more software then hardware. The phone vendors can't seem to get the software right.

b) selling lower cost phone, which should require lower subsidies, provide better quality software, more applications. streamlined hardware sales, etc...

Does anyone really believe that within a couple of revisions, microsoft would have the best software in the phone arena? MS has shown again and again, an ability to produce the higher quality software then any other major software developer. I'd expect them to spank the floor with most cell phone / software vendors.


-jb

[lmtuxinc]

Bring on the Dell Smartphone for Sprint!

[Mike Temporale]

Dell is getting into the cell phone business eh?! Wow, Nokia better watch out. We've all seen how what Dell did to the PDA market.

This is great news. I look forward to seeing what HP and Dell can offer in this field.

[mememe]

Originally Posted by Jason Dunn

Think it sounds crazy? Just wait and see what happens over the next 24 months...

The mobile handset marketplace is a beast all unto itself. Primarily, this is due the actual cost of the hardware being subsidized by the provider of the network. To think that MS doesn't want to drive incremental margin increases (this is why they are trying to enter a new market) is not viewpoint that would be taken by those dealing with MS and various carriers.

Network providers don't want to continue to subsidize hardware to the same extent as they have in the past. Driving economies of scale is something that is a benefit to the entire industry, but to think that an MS smartphone platform will, in fact, be cheaper than what Nokia/SE/Siemens brings to the market is a falicy.

To that point this battle for MS supremacy in the mobile handset market will be long, hard, and (ultimately) one they probably won't dominate. This is not to say that they wont make good inroads, but... it aint the same as a PC. Just look at the efforts on the PPC and XBOX front..