Is Windows Phone Dying?

_Kaiser_

Let me preface this by saying I'm now on my 3rd WP (a Lumia 1320) and love the platform - the clean, uncluttered interface, the performance of the OS on even lower-end handsets, and as I'm not a big app, mobile games, or social network user anyway, I don't care that the latest "fad" on other platforms isn't available.

But reading some of the stories over on WPC lately (talk of an Android Lumia, MS prioritising other platforms, delisting of XBox games etc) makes me wonder what the medium-long term future for the platform is.

2+ years on and WP market share is still extremely poor. I have seen the reports that claim 10% in Europe but I'd wager most of that is low-end cheap devices. In the US it's still struggling in the single digits. I think the acquisition of Nokia's Lumia range will actually hamper things insofar as they are now the only real choice if you want regular updates and support - Samsung for example is awful at this, even on Android stuff.

I think another issue is that in some ways the benefits of the platform that I mentioned earlier are limiting its uptake. The 920 I started with is still perfectly usable now, will get the latest updates and has held up very well physically. Good for me yes, but not so much a company that is already struggling to make an impact. Why WOULD I rush out to buy the latest model when there's very little real differences between most of the handsets out there? Sure the specs are incrementally improved, but there's no REAL changes in most cases.
I'm not saying MS should start making older devices obsolete within 12 months as happens say with Android, but right now there's very little reason for me to spend more money on the platform.

I think as well that the changes at the top in MS and the developments I mentioned at the start have signalled a shift away from the WP platform. If MS were serious about it, they could push it as a true Desktop companion for example. Windows 7/8/whatever is still the standard for PCs and laptops - imagine if your WP linked seamlessly with it.. I'm not talking about transferring pictures or whatever as is the case now, but being able to get at your SMS from your laptop, being able to make calls on your mobile from a Desktop (Skype?) client etc.

As someone who uses VOIP/IM every day in the office, it'd be great if I could just pair my phone to my laptop/tablet when I got home and respond to any calls/texts/apps directly without having to pick up the handset at all. I know you can do (some of) this with Android already (or maybe all of it by now), but it seems like an easy and useful opportunity to exploit and market.

I'll probably stick with WP until they do pull it - if that's what happens - but I'm starting to feel that it's not really going anywhere fast and there seems to be little indication that that's going to change. WP 8.1 is a very worthwhile update, but really it's bug fixes and bringing features that should have been there from the start (notification centre for example) but nothing NEW/different. Cortana is something I couldn't see myself using daily or beyond maybe a few days as a novelty (no more than I used the Android versions previously), but what else is there to draw a new user?

Maybe it's just me(?), but I wouldn't mind hearing others take on it - especially those who have been using the platform for a while as well.

inforfun

Took the 520 last year just to try a windows phone and love it.
Wanted to get the 1520 but ...damn that thing is huge when you have it in your hand.

Problem i have with it now is that i am missing a screen size in between the 1020 and 1520 sizes.

Also have use of a Samsung Note 1 and as it comes to operating system, i much prefer my 520.

long_b

inforfun wrote: »

Problem i have with it now is that i am missing a screen size in between the 1020 and 1520 sizes.

.

Here come the 930

OP, very interesting post.
I think Microsoft's recent softening on supporting other platforms may be more related to the new CEO's cloud focus - they may just want to get users hooked up to their online services whichever way they can.

I'd love to see tight integration between Windows and WP8.1 too - you have to think that they're already working very hard on that in the background.

simi956

@Kaiser2000 Keep with the platform all the current leaks are one source evleaks which are not always true, With other OEM Manufacturers now onboard with Wp8.1, HTC/Samsung/LG will be releasing new devices soon. With the Developer Preview program working so well, the next update WP8.1 Update will be releasing soon enough

AntiVirus

If you've been keeping up with WPC you'll have read about the "BIG" change that is coming to Windows Phone soon, it hasn't been announced yet. It could be everything that you want!

I've been very happy with my 920 and don't see any reason to change to another OS. The only thing that I would like that I'm missing is a Bank of Ireland banking app but I can use the actual website on the phone so its no big deal for me really.

I do use voip (Blueface) a lot and would also love to be able to add in the voip settings so I could make/receive voip calls when ever I'm on a wifi network.

In fact I wish mobile phone operator's would allow mobile phone calls to be made over wifi connection where the signal is very poor. :-)

jimmynokia

Purely from a future perspective possibly MS are admitting defeat with WP as a competitive OS,allowing the X2 to go ahead,and also the rumor mills of an android lumia?
After all they are gateways to the ecosystem..

Oasis1974

If they finish WP whats the deal with my phone i just got it do i bin the thing and have to blow money on a new one?

bidiots

I would add a pinch of salt first;)

jimmynokia

Oasis1974 wrote: »

If they finish WP whats the deal with my phone i just got it do i bin the thing and have to blow money on a new one?

You will be ok for another 2/3 years anyway,by then something new will be tasty..

KingOfFairview

Hmm...

I have to admit my patience is wearing a bit thin. Still major issues with xbox music. Still very little real innovation. Apps aren't everything to me, but I hate knowing I'll have to wait months if not years to get then after android or IOS users. I just feel Microsoft doesn't care much either way. I love the interface, ease of use and style, but I'm a bit sick of thinking "if I just give it a few more months..."

_Kaiser_

Exactly..

I just think that MS has decided to focus more on the service itself than the hardware that's accessing it - which makes sense if they're positioning themselves as a "cloud services" company.
Unfortunately I think this means that the WP platform will continue to lag behind IOS and Android as there's very little push (that I can see anyway) to sell the platform beyond a few ads for lower-end handsets.

WP 8.1 does improve things a lot as I said, but most of the improvements are just bug fixes or catching up with the other platforms and even then there's still issues - notifications still aren't 100% under 8.1 for example.
I love my 1320 for the size and performance, but I could get a Note 3 and load on Launcher 8 for the UI experience. I did it before with Launcher 7 and a Note 2 and it worked pretty well.

I figure I'll give it till Christmas and see how things look then, but if the stagnation in terms of innovation continues I may jump back

TimeToShine

If they don't make snapchat accessible they are doomed WRT the younger generation.

_Kaiser_

TimeToShine wrote: »

If they don't make snapchat accessible they are doomed WRT the younger generation.

There seems to be a big push to get BBM on the platform (a private Beta is currently ongoing) but I don't know if this is still relevant given the decline of Blackberry? Another ship that sailed?

TimeToShine

Kaiser2000 wrote: »

There seems to be a big push to get BBM on the platform (a private Beta is currently ongoing) but I don't know if this is still relevant given the decline of Blackberry? Another ship that sailed?

BBM Seems to still be going in the US but not much here. I have a brother who's 13 and a sister who's 16 and their primary method of communication is via snapchat. Hell, even people in their 20s are using it. As silly as it may seem, this is primarily the reason for young fellas/girls going for Android/iOS over windows phones - at least in my experience anyway.

Fingleberries

TimeToShine wrote: »

If they don't make snapchat accessible they are doomed WRT the younger generation.

6snap is a Snapchat client for WP8 / 8.1 and does the job perfectly well as (if not better than) SnapChat.

_Kaiser_

It seems that the latest rumours now involve Android apps appearing on WP

I've no idea if the sources quoted are reliable (the responses there seem to think so) but I could only imagine this move - if true - further damaging the WP platform.

It would help if we got a clear statement of intent from MS - or is that what this "BIG change" is maybe about?

smacg

Im not even a big user of my phone or apps really which is why I am happy enough with Windows, but it does get a bit frustrating when you keep seeing things available for iOS and Android. No mention of Windows. If that doesnt start to change soon, the figures will always be low.

Fingleberries

smacg wrote: »

Im not even a big user of my phone or apps really which is why I am happy enough with Windows, but it does get a bit frustrating when you keep seeing things available for iOS and Android. No mention of Windows. If that doesnt start to change soon, the figures will always be low.

As WP8.1 and Windows 8.1 update 1 become more prominent, perhaps we shall see more universal apps coming around.

KingOfFairview

Fingleberries wrote: »

As WP8.1 and Windows 8.1 update 1 become more prominent, perhaps we shall see more universal apps coming around.

Market share needs to be getting towards ten percent before that'll happen

Fingleberries

Wow. Just, Wow.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-28348223

This is amazing stuff:
1. Build Phone OS that has potential
2. Struggle to get anyone to make phones on the OS
3. One Company (Nokia) eventually takes on the OS
4. Nokia struggles to make the OS a success
5. Pump Billions into Nokia to subsidise their efforts
6. Nokia finally makes a success of it, selling millions of handsets, raises the profile of the Windows Phone OS so people can actually recognise it and consider using it.
7. Buy that Nokia for further Billions
8. Take it out back, shoot it, and sell it to the Glue factory.
9. Reduce Licencing revenue for Windows Phone
10. Hope lots of other Handset manufacturers pick up the slack and make it a success.
11. ???
12. Profit ... or Go To Step 1, do not go past 'Go', do not collect $200.

PaulieC

Fingleberries wrote: »

Wow. Just, Wow.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-28348223

This is amazing stuff:
1. Build Phone OS that has potential
2. Struggle to get anyone to make phones on the OS
3. One Company (Nokia) eventually takes on the OS
4. Nokia struggles to make the OS a success
5. Pump Billions into Nokia to subsidise their efforts
6. Nokia finally makes a success of it, selling millions of handsets, raises the profile of the Windows Phone OS so people can actually recognise it and consider using it.
7. Buy that Nokia for further Billions
8. Take it out back, shoot it, and sell it to the Glue factory.
9. Reduce Licencing revenue for Windows Phone
10. Hope lots of other Handset manufacturers pick up the slack and make it a success.
11. ???
12. Profit ... or Go To Step 1, do not go past 'Go', do not collect $200.

hmm not sure you understand.

The purchase of Nokia automatically necessitated job losses due to the large amount of duplication of roles across the two companies e.g. finance, marketing etc.
This cost was included in the purchase of the company (the cost of redundancies).
The layoffs are happening at the same time as a major company restructuring, which has nothing to do with how well (or not) Windows Phone is doing. The re-structuring is aimed at removing layers of middle management and making the company more responsive.

If you read Stephen Elop's memo you can see that they are putting WP front and centre, even to the extent of porting the Nokia X line over to Lumia.

PaulieC

one other thing. Since they removed the license fee for WP, there have been a host of companies making and releasing WP devices. So if looks like that was actually a good thing.

Fingleberries

PaulieC wrote: »

hmm not sure you understand.

The purchase of Nokia automatically necessitated job losses due to the large amount of duplication of roles across the two companies e.g. finance, marketing etc.
This cost was included in the purchase of the company (the cost of redundancies).
The layoffs are happening at the same time as a major company restructuring, which has nothing to do with how well (or not) Windows Phone is doing. The re-structuring is aimed at removing layers of middle management and making the company more responsive.

If you read Stephen Elop's memo you can see that they are putting WP front and centre, even to the extent of porting the Nokia X line over to Lumia.

Thanks - I had got it and was going for an 'Underpants Gnomes' sort of analysis on the plan for profitability. Although they only had 3 phases on their plan.

There's no way to buy a company with 30,000 employees without there being significant duplication (HR, Finance, Marketing as you mention).

Killing off the Asha, X and Symbian lines will allow more focus on the Marquee phone (a la iPhone, nexus and Galaxy S) once a year, and a whole slew of low end 5xx, 6xx, 7xx models.

Facetious and all as I was being with my summary. It is a high price to pay for a company that you are essentially going to strip down to it's core (Lumia) business.

Ballmer probably did well to get out of buying all the HERE maps stuff as well.

Francie Barrett

PaulieC wrote: »

The purchase of Nokia automatically necessitated job losses due to the large amount of duplication of roles across the two companies e.g. finance, marketing etc.

I am sure duplication of this sort exists, but most of the employees being let go were core to old Nokia's business. Lumia sales were only a small fraction of total Nokia shipments and the various product lines (NokiaX, Asha and dumbphones) were all distinct products and each would have had dedicated factories, developers and other technical people devoted to creating those products. With this announcement, all these products are being EOL'd.

Francie Barrett

Fingleberries wrote: »

Wow. Just, Wow.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-28348223

This is amazing stuff:
1. Build Phone OS that has potential
2. Struggle to get anyone to make phones on the OS
3. One Company (Nokia) eventually takes on the OS
4. Nokia struggles to make the OS a success
5. Pump Billions into Nokia to subsidise their efforts
6. Nokia finally makes a success of it, selling millions of handsets, raises the profile of the Windows Phone OS so people can actually recognise it and consider using it.
7. Buy that Nokia for further Billions
8. Take it out back, shoot it, and sell it to the Glue factory.
9. Reduce Licencing revenue for Windows Phone
10. Hope lots of other Handset manufacturers pick up the slack and make it a success.
11. ???
12. Profit ... or Go To Step 1, do not go past 'Go', do not collect $200.

The key in all this is to remember that Microsoft have a new CEO.

The original strategy (Elop and Ballmer's) with the Nokia merger was to keep all the old Nokia products, but to use them as a gateway into Lumia and Microsoft services. Since this deal was agreed the landscape has changed. Asha and dumb phones sales have been in collapse and NokiaX simply ended up competing with the Lumia 520. With no evidence that supporting these products was leading to Lumia sales; why bother with them? The fact that Microsoft already have a sub-$100 Windows Phone (Nokia 520/530) - then it simply made no sense for Microsoft to expend time and resources on a market that was dying out. If someone wants to try and squeeze out a few pennies in the emerging markets with budget phones, Nadella is probably thinking, who cares? I think it's actually a smart move from him. The Nokia acquisition looks like a lemon of a purchase that would only continue to cost hundreds of millions every quarter. It's best to reduce the scope of the losses now, rather than lose more money by inaction.

The real villains in all this are Ballmer and Elop. Ballmer for having this ridiculous grandiose vision that by buying Nokia, he would be able to compete with Apple as a devices company. Elop the even bigger villain by taking the world's largest phone manufacturer and one of best innovators in mobile technology when he took over and grinding it to nothing in just three years.

PaulieC

Yes, you're right, most of the job losses will occur in manufacturing plants where stuff like the Ashas/dumbphones were manufactured. Nokia was bought for it's handset division my MS, so anything that is not part of the MS portfolio as planned by the new CEO was always bound to be cut.
Whether or not the purchase was a good idea or not or whether the price paid was too high, they are now in a situation where they have a hardware business to enable them to make their own phones/tablets. While Nokia went 'all in' on WP, there was still the problem of two distinct companies with different priorities trying to make essentially one product i.e. Windows Phones. This caused problems, with both companies doing different things on different timelines, leading to the likes of the Lumia specific updates for the phones that really should have been part of the OS. At least now there will only be one guiding hand and one set of objectives, so things should be, at the very least, a bit clearer in terms of future direction.
It's easy to point the finger at Elop and say he ruined Nokia, but in reality Nokia was already dead when he took over. It will be interesting to see how he does with his new division in MS. He was always one of Ballmer's guys, so I think it says some thing that Nadella is not only keeping him on, but trusting him with a pretty large group, responsible for a lot of underperforming products.
We are starting to see real differences in MS between Ballmer and Nadella and that's fundamentally down to the fact that Ballmer was a businessman while Nadella is an engineer. MS was allowed to grow lazy and fat under Ballmer (see xbox TV group, WTF was that all about ?), so it's great to see that some of the fat is being trimmed (of course it's always sad to see folks losing their jobs) and we should see some genuine progress from here on.

_Puma_

Was reading on WpCentral that MS are now spinning of mixradio as they want to elevate xbox music. The guys at mixradio are looking into offering mixradio on IoS and Android now but will not be cutting ties completely with WP.

I wonder what this will mean for HERE maps? Would not be surprised to see these former Nokia services being put behind a Microsoft paywall like an xbox live subscription. If something like this happens I can safely say I will be going back to an Android like a Nexus.

PaulieC

_Puma_ wrote: »

Was reading on WpCentral that MS are now spinning of mixradio as they want to elevate xbox music. The guys at mixradio are looking into offering mixradio on IoS and Android now but will not be cutting ties completely with WP.

I wonder what this will mean for HERE maps? Would not be surprised to see these former Nokia services being put behind a Microsoft paywall like an xbox live subscription. If something like this happens I can safely say I will be going back to an Android like a Nexus.

IIRC part of the Nokia deal is that MS would continue to licence Here maps. I can't see that offering it as part of a sub would make any sense and I think they are seeing that now for themselves with the changes made recently to xbox live.
As for MixRadio, who cares about that ? Why would anyone want to pay for a music service where you can't pick your own music ?

Francie Barrett

PaulieC wrote: »

It's easy to point the finger at Elop and say he ruined Nokia, but in reality Nokia was already dead when he took over.

Agree with pretty much everything except for that. Nokia smartphone sales were growing for months after Elop took charge, mainly due to the N8 which was a hit. On February 2011, Elop announced that Meego and Symbian were being discontinued. Nokia went from nearly 30 million Symbian shipments to about 5 million Windows Phone shipments in just a year. The vast majority of Nokia customers jumped ship to Android - it was at that point that Nokia were finished. The Windows Phone market was simply far too small to sustain a company of Nokia's size.

_Puma_

PaulieC wrote: »

IIRC part of the Nokia deal is that MS would continue to licence Here maps. I can't see that offering it as part of a sub would make any sense and I think they are seeing that now for themselves with the changes made recently to xbox live.
As for MixRadio, who cares about that ? Why would anyone want to pay for a music service where you can't pick your own music ?

Mixradio (formerly Nokia Music) is one of the most used apps on Lumias. Do you understand the type of service it is? It is not an on Demand Streaming service. It is actually a very popular "radio" service like Pandora or blinkbox.(Btw you dont pay anything unless you want unlimited skips, no adds no limited uses etc.. It is actually one of the smartest business models I've seen around for these type of services)

With Microsoft levereging their own subscription services elsewhere I would say it is very likely something like HERE maps will be put behind a paywall.

wrt40

Fingleberries wrote: »

Wow. Just, Wow.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-28348223

This is amazing stuff:
1. Build Phone OS that has potential
2. Struggle to get anyone to make phones on the OS
3. One Company (Nokia) eventually takes on the OS
4. Nokia struggles to make the OS a success
5. Pump Billions into Nokia to subsidise their efforts
6. Nokia finally makes a success of it, selling millions of handsets, raises the profile of the Windows Phone OS so people can actually recognise it and consider using it.
7. Buy that Nokia for further Billions
8. Take it out back, shoot it, and sell it to the Glue factory.
9. Reduce Licencing revenue for Windows Phone
10. Hope lots of other Handset manufacturers pick up the slack and make it a success.
11. ???
12. Profit ... or Go To Step 1, do not go past 'Go', do not collect $200.

Only that's not what is happening at all. They are keeping anything that is good and needed from Nokia and assimilating it into Microsoft. They also have standardised the hardware guidelines so that it is inline with Android devices (soft buttons for example), allowing 3rd party manufacturers to have the same or very similar hardware for Android and Windows allowing them to adopt windows without much hassle. They already have some manufacturers lined up.

I have gone from iPhone (mobile phone for dummies) to Android (laggy and messy) and now moving onto Windows phone with my new green Lumia 930 on route in the post as we speak :-) (yes, green!)

Personally I'm very positive about the Microsoft mobile platform and the direction of the company overall. I'm not a huge app user, so with that negative aside I find their platform hugely attractive and 8.1 is getting great reviews. The big break through is about a year away with Windows Threshold (a.k.a Windows 9) and universal apps across all platforms including Xbox.

Until then, what they have so far in 8.1 is good enough for me. Some banking apps would be a plus but my bank has a mobile website which is basically the same as an app.