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  #1  
Old 02-23-2011, 04:00 PM
Brad Wasson
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Default Microsoft-Nokia Partnership - Ten Days In

Well, it was pretty much ten days ago that we heard the first detailed information about a new relationship between Microsoft and Nokia. It certainly turned into a week or so of intrigue. Let's look back at some of the major events that occurred following the announcement.

11-Feb: Microsoft and Nokia announce a strategic partnership in which Windows Phone will become Nokia's principal smartphone platform. Nokia also reveals that they will be able to fully customize the Windows Phone 7 experience, should they so desire. Stephen Elop, the new Nokia CEO, also reveals that there will be substantial reductions in employment within the company.

12-Feb: 15-year Microsoft sales and marketing veteran Chris Weber replaces Nokia USA president Mark Louison effective immediately.

13-Feb: While on stage at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Elop announces that their first priority is beating Android. They also mention that we will likely see Nokia Windows Phone 7 devices in 2011, with volume shipments in 2012. Reports also surface that Microsoft paid "billions' of dollars for the right to supply Nokia with software.

15-Feb: At their Mobile World Congress keynote, HTC's CEO expresses his opinion that the new Microsoft-Nokia partnership will strengthen the Windows Phone 7 ecosystem. Verizon's CTO, Tony Melone, also speaking at the Congress, comments that he doesn't see the need for them to have a Windows Phone 7 offering on their network while Apple, Android and RIM are still at play. Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, revealed in his Congress speech that they did try to convince Nokia to adopt Android, but were unsuccessful. Finally, Christy Wyatt, Motorola's Corporate Vice President of Software and Services Product Management, said that while she would never say never, she doesn't envision Motorola using Microsoft's new phone platform.

16-Feb: Lots of bantering about the 25% drop in Nokia stock price since the announcement of the Microsoft deal. Also, a story emerges about a supposed group of disgruntled shareholders developing a plan to oust Elop and restore the development focus on Meego (this was later proved to be a hoax).

18-Feb: Nokia attempts to entice developers to "stay" and develop for Windows Phone 7 by offering hardware and other incentives.

19-Feb: Reuters quotes Intel CEO Paul Otellini as saying "I wouldn't have made the decision he made, I would probably have gone to Android if I were him. MeeGo would have been the best strategy but he concluded he couldn't afford it." Nokia also addresses industry concerns that Windows Phone 7 won't be deployed on low-end phones which appeal to large market segments. Elop claims that have a plan to address that very issue.

While these were some of the more public developments, debate has raged over just how sound a decision Nokia has made, and how important this will be to Windows Phone 7's success.

I will say this for sure, the deal has cast a significant amount of attention on Windows Phone 7 and Microsoft's predicament. As Windows Phone Thoughts readers will attest, there are a whole lot of issues to be surmounted before Windows Phone 7 reaches any sort of mass success. One of those issues is clearly having a major manufacturer get behind the platform in a big way. This deal accomplishes that. At the very least, it is a strong endorsement for Microsoft, politics considered or not. I think, though, that the bigger issue for Windows Phone 7 right now is the prognosis for a future thriving ecosystem around the platform. It is not obvious to me that this deal will be a tremendous help in that regard. Microsoft needs a bevy of developers to be bringing their best ideas forward in the form of apps, it needs other product developers to be producing accessories for Windows Phone 7 phones, and it needs to build excitement about the possibilities that the platform offers. I don't think this deal helps much in these aspects.

In my opinion, from where we are observing things at this point in time, there are just too many questions about Nokia itself for public sentiment to be that this partnership has solidified Windows Phone 7 as a major market player. It's a significant step forward, just not all the steps needed.

 
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Old 02-23-2011, 08:13 PM
Nelson Ocampo
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I think people sometimes forget that Nokia gets a lot out of this partnership.

Their services, such as for maps, will be integrated into Windows Phone. So as the ecosystem grows, Nokia services reach more customers.

Sure, this isn't the final step. There's a lot of work to do. But in my mind, this partnership almost guarantees that there will be at least moderate success for the Windows Phone ecosystem.
 
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Old 02-23-2011, 09:14 PM
Fritzly
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Nelson Ocampo View Post
I think people sometimes forget that Nokia gets a lot out of this partnership.
I am not so sure about this; if Nokia will go exclusively with WP7, as it seems right now, no matter what they gained for a hardware manufacturer like them a single OS is a kiss of death.

Furthertmore WP7 is in its infancy and I believe it wil never grow: 2 or 3 years from now and Windows 8 will power smartphones too.
 
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Old 02-23-2011, 10:19 PM
Nelson Ocampo
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Originally Posted by Fritzly View Post
I am not so sure about this; if Nokia will go exclusively with WP7, as it seems right now, no matter what they gained for a hardware manufacturer like them a single OS is a kiss of death.
Since when has a single OS been the kiss of death? It certainly has done well for Apple. And can you name the other Smartphone OS's that Motorola is using? They seem to be doing pretty dandy right now.

Also, keep in mind that Windows Phone is only going to power their smartphones. (And for the next year or two, they will also still have Symbian devices) They will still have their feature phones that aren't using Windows Phone.

Not to mention that they still have MeeGo research going on just in case it is needed for the future.

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Furthertmore WP7 is in its infancy and I believe it wil never grow: 2 or 3 years from now and Windows 8 will power smartphones too.
Never grow?

I'm going to have to disagree strongly with this.

Will WP7 be huge? Probably not. Will Windows Phone after version 7 be huge? Maybe.

Remember that Windows Phone uses apps that are developed with Silverlight and XNA. One advantage of running managed code is that they could make a bunch of changes to the underlying OS and not affect the apps.

If 3 years from now, the core of Windows Phone becomes Windows 8, that will be fine. They will still be using a familiar Windows Phone UI layer, and it will still run all of the existing apps and games.
 
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Old 02-23-2011, 10:40 PM
Jason Dunn
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Originally Posted by Fritzly View Post
...and Windows 8 will power smartphones too.
A desktop OS on a handheld device will *always* suck. From a UI perspective, from a battery life perspective, from a performance perspective...it's going to suck. I'm a fan of most things Microsoft does, but this is going to end in failure just like all their similar efforts to put a big OS onto a small device have failed.
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Old 02-24-2011, 02:45 AM
virain
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jason Dunn View Post
A desktop OS on a handheld device will *always* suck. From a UI perspective, from a battery life perspective, from a performance perspective...it's going to suck. I'm a fan of most things Microsoft does, but this is going to end in failure just like all their similar efforts to put a big OS onto a small device have failed.
I may disagree with this statement. If mobile device is powerful enough to handle OS and OS is light enough to run on a mobile device, the only question would be UI, and it can be solved by developers, same way we have browsers right now, mobile version and desktop. That actually saves some work for developer as he wouldn't have to write whole new app for mobile device if he has one for desktop already.
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Old 02-24-2011, 02:46 AM
Jason Dunn
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I may disagree with this statement. If mobile device is powerful enough to handle OS and OS is light enough to run on a mobile device, the only question would be UI, and it can be solved by developers...
I'd love to be proven wrong someday, but all I've seen is failure after failure in this area - so far no one has been able to do it without significant limitations and compromise.
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Old 02-24-2011, 02:54 AM
Fritzly
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jason Dunn View Post
A desktop OS on a handheld device will *always* suck. From a UI perspective, from a battery life perspective, from a performance perspective...it's going to suck. I'm a fan of most things Microsoft does, but this is going to end in failure just like all their similar efforts to put a big OS onto a small device have failed.
Wait and see: W8,at least right now, is going to be something completely different from what we are use to see from MS; modularity is the magic word.......

W8 kernel has been shown running on ARM chips; it will run fine on Smartphones too without all the several layers that will be implemented on the desktop version. Besides it makes sense because the scale economy it will permit.

Check automaker: there are so many parts taht are common for different models and even brands that is unbelievable.
 
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