Microsoft officially unveiled its initial lineup of Windows Phone 7 devices today, with the Samsung Focus looking to be the first US handset available—it’ll start selling on November 8th for $200 with a two-year AT&T contract.
While the first crop of handsets and the shiny, new operating system running atop them certainly look polished, Microsoft still has a lot of catching up to do when it comes to competing with Apple, BlackBerry, and Android platforms here in the US—add Symbian to the list of European competitors, too.
Here’s what I think we can expect to see play out over the coming months.
Windows Phone 7 Won’t Fail
While the whole Kin debacle didn’t inspire much confidence in anyone, the same won’t happen with Windows Phone 7.
In case you missed it, Microsoft spent about $1 billion developing tween-friendly “social networking” phones with the Kin moniker and partnered with Verizon to sell them. The minimum monthly service charge ran $70 and there were no apps, no calendar, and no instant messaging function. Fun for tweens, right? The entire project was scrapped within a few months.
Kin was seen as kind of a precursor to Windows Phone 7. The interface was similar to what we’ll see with Windows Phone 7 handsets, with the biggest difference being that Windows Phone 7 phones will feature apps, a calendar, instant messaging capabilities, and more—all for the same monthly price. It’s almost better that Microsoft killed off Kin like it did. Now there’s no chance of Kin devices possibly cannibalizing sales of Windows Phone 7 devices.
If not for dumping a billion dollars down the tubes like it did with Kin, the whole ordeal could be seen as a learning experience.
So for anyone drawing conclusions between Kin’s fate and the fate of Windows Phone 7, Windows Phone 7 is what Kin probably should have been all along. The only way Microsoft and Verizon could have gotten away with Kin is if they priced the service at $30 per month or less—$70 was insane.
Windows Phone 7 doesn’t draw the same “What the hell are they thinking?” reaction from everyone since the phones and the service plans are in line with all the iPhones, BlackBerrys, and Android phones on the market.
The World Doesn’t Need Another Mobile Platform! Right?
It doesn’t really matter whether or not the world needs another mobile platform, because Microsoft and the wireless industry are bringing Windows Phone 7 to the market anyway. And you’ll recall that the Windows Mobile platform has existed for quite some time now. While Windows Mobile handsets won’t just vaporize right away, you can expect to see Windows Phone 7 wholeheartedly replace Windows Mobile in due time.
Microsoft’s official line right now may be that Windows Mobile 6.5 is made (and will remain) for the enterprise while Windows Phone 7 is for consumers, but watch as Windows Phone 7 slowly starts to add enterprise-level enhancements over time to eventually phase out Windows Mobile.
What the world may not need is another platform that’s identical to one of the existing popular platforms. Here’s how they shake out now.
Apple basically sells one device: the iPhone. Yes, there are a few versions floating around the market now and there’s the iPod Touch and the iPad but from a basic software standpoint, Apple’s mobile platform is the iPhone.
RIM sells several different BlackBerry handsets. Like Apple, RIM designs its own handsets. Unlike Apple, RIM makes several different form factors with several different hardware and input configurations to target several different income demographics.
Android (Google) doesn’t make any of its own devices, but lets anyone use its software for free. There are certain minimal restrictions in place for handsets to be able to display the Google logo and add Google-specific software applications such as the Android Market, Gmail, and YouTube. For the most part, though, it’s a free-for-all. You’ll find Android on tablets, laptops, and phones ranging from versions 1.5 to 2.2.
Windows Phone 7 will settle in nicely somewhere between RIM and Apple. You’ll have the various form factors and device options like you do with RIM, but they’ll be more differentiated from one another while sporting a more Apple-like baseline hardware configuration. You’ll notice that the handsets announced today all feature a 1GHz Snapdragon CPU and similar screen resolutions, which will make it much easier for app developers to make apps that work on any and all Windows Phone 7 handsets. Which brings us to…
The Apps
The apps, the apps, it’s all about the apps. And how you get developers to build apps for your platform? Make it easy for them.
Apple makes it easy because there’s basically just one device: the iPhone. Android makes it a little more difficult because there are all sorts of different hardware devices running Android. If you’re seriously developing an Android app, you’re probably concentrating on the Android phones sold through the carriers, which all feature relatively similar means of input and software versions. But some of those phones feature custom interfaces, some are running Android 2.1, some are running 2.2, some have square screen aspect ratios, some have widescreen aspect ratios, and on and on and on.
BlackBerry is apparently the hardest platform for developers. In an interview with Darren Cross, head of business development at Fandango, Computerworld relays the following regarding app development:
“Cross said it took about the same time and effort to build Fandango for Android as for WP7, although Android has proven more difficult because it has different device versions on the market and many device makers have their own interface overlays, such as the Touchwiz overlay on the Samsung Captivate.
BlackBerry has been the hardest to build for, given that it offers so many types of devices and different ways to input information. The iPhone has been the easiest, Cross said, because it is locked down in terms of its interface and hardware variations.”
Microsoft has opted against letting hardware manufacturers tweak the Windows Phone 7 interface like they’re able to do with Android. So even though we’ll see multiple Windows Phone 7 handsets from various manufacturers, the look and feel of the software will be the same on all of them. During the presentation today, Microsoft also mentioned that updates to the Windows Phone 7 software can be pushed out to the handsets directly from Microsoft—you won’t have to wait for your specific handset to get the new software like you do with certain Android phones.
If anything, Microsoft gets dinged for not making Windows Phone 7 backwards compatible with existing Windows Mobile applications. Again, this should be seen as a sign that Windows Mobile will eventually be phased out and, more importantly, it allows developers to easily program apps for Windows Phone 7. The underlying tools available to make Windows Phone 7 programs include .NET, Silverlight, and XNA, which plenty of developers already use to program for the PC and Xbox 360.
The Nutshell
The Windows Phone 7 platform will most likely resemble Apple’s iPhone, believe it or not. It’ll be much more polished and structured than Android, though not as “open,” and it’ll be more slick and powerful than BlackBerry, though not as business-centric at first.
If Microsoft is smart, it won’t play the “who has the most apps?” game and will instead focus on quality over quantity. I’ll take 10,000 high-quality apps over Android’s 80,000+ or Apple’s 200,000+ apps. Microsoft has made it easy for developers to program apps for Windows Phone 7 and has the clout to line up big-name companies, as it’s already done with EA, for instance.
Smaller developers may feel squeezed out at first but if a particular app does well on other platforms, it’ll likely show up on Windows Phone 7 in short order. We won’t see fart apps, copycats, and soundboards, thankfully, since the barrier to entry is way too expensive.
As for the hardware, imagine handsets that are slick like the iPhone except you get to choose whether you want one with a slide-out keyboard, a huge screen, a nicer camera, or whatever interests you the most. When it’s time to upgrade, the next device you get will be just as easy to pick up and start using as it is for an iPhone 3GS user playing with an iPhone 4 for the first time since the interface can’t be tweaked by the hardware manufacturers.
Don’t expect Microsoft to inundate the market with handsets like Android has. Expect about as many, at any given time, as BlackBerry offers. Unlike BlackBerry, though, most of the phones will be higher-end devices with many selling at the $200 price point—there may be one for $150 here and there and maybe a few $250+ high-end ones, but don’t expect the penny phones any time soon like you see with the BlackBerry brand.
All in all, yes, Microsoft is late to the party. Very late. Embarrassingly late. But consumers have short memories and it probably won’t take more than an app store full of quality downloads and some pretty heavy marketing for Microsoft to get back into the running. With estimates ranging between $400 and $500 million for the initial marketing blitz, the seemingly nice balance of hardware options against a consistent user experience, and the ease at which apps can be developed, Windows Phone 7 can definitely hold its own.
More on Techland:
EA Mobile Onboard to Publish Windows Phone 7 Games
Complete List of Windows Phone 7 Devices Available at Launch