The partnership between Nokia and Microsoft deepens. Updates to Nokia Lumia devices change the Marketplace tile to a specific Nokia tile – unheard of for Windows Phone, which is governed by strict rules. This is part of the Tango update. Is this an innocent change, or the prelude to fragmentation, or worse – a fork? While that’s probably a little dramatic, this probably does worry the other Windows Phone OEMs.
If Nokia keeps getting exclusive apps, it is going to discourage others from playing. Nokia took the Microsoft $250,000 bribe to become the dominant player, but Samsung and HTC are only making these POS phones because it was part of the agreement that kept them from getting sued by Microsoft over patents! (some would call this behavior extortion!)
So what is the benefit to other manufacturers to licence and build WP7 (or WP8) devices? NONE.
What are the chances that Windows Phones will start selling in large numbers? ZERO.
What are the chances that Elop will be loaded in a heittokone and launched out a window at the next shareholders meeting? Pretty damn good!
I think it was to be expected since Nokia, besides of course MS, is the only other company beating really hard on Windows Phone.
The problem for Nokia is: is it going to pay? No one knows yet. And if it fails I hope they kept one ace up its sleeve because they are going to need it badly.
On the other hand, Microsoft can play wait-and-see (well, more like: if it does not work first time, try again and again until it sticks) like they did on many occasions (word x wordperfect, dbase x (access+foxpro), excel x lotus 123, xbox x playstation, etc). They have a huge money influx from office and windows and, contrary to what many say, this is not going away any time soon.
Anyway, if it fails Ballmer will feel the heat. Probably “game over” for him (so sad, poor guy, NOT!).
I agree, Nokia has a lot to lose, while Microsoft has a minor risk here.
Actually Microsoft stopped taking any risks recently, and went on milking comfortable products. For example, on their Xbox division, except for bringing the occasional indies, they keep releasing newer versions of the same games (Halo, Forza, Gears). The once innovative developers division has bowed to OS division. Instead of bringing newer languages (like F#), and they started betting everything on C++, and essentially killed Silverlight and similar technologies.
I do not know how long they can continue without innovation.
Funny, because WinRT is the new torch bearer for XAML technologies. If anything, they dramatically improved the XAML stack.
It would be beneficial for DevDiv to try to get as much of their brainchildren into the core of Windows as possible, because that’s their ticket to prosperity.
They successfully managed to get XAML baked into Windows, where the XAML team is now a division within WinDiv. You can be sure that now, whereas XAML previously had a questionable future, it is thoroughly engrained into the DNA of Windows.
Errr… C# surely? And F# was a research project. A lot of the dynamic stuff from that project was folded back in to 3.5 and 4.0 of the CLR and exposed to all languages.
As for Silverlight, it’s still being used. I installed it only the other day to watch Netflix on my Mac. The runtime is still a target in Visual Studio and it’s the basis of the current Windows Phone 7 SDK, so it’s hardly “dead”.
Really?
What is F# then doing on my Visual Studio 2010/2011?
Or why is the F# team looking for new developers?
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/dsyme/archive/2012/01/14/come-and-work-with…
Seriously? With all the news and long threads around, didn’t you notice Win8 & Metro? (quite risky I’d say – judging by, at the least, inevitable grumbling about changes)
Or, from Xbox division: Kinect.
Edited 2012-05-18 00:03 UTC
> The problem for Nokia is: is it going to pay?
> No one knows yet.
I think we have the answer already. Nokia is down to 8% (!!!) world-wide market-share and it’s going down future. Nokia makes billion loses every quarter. The first Lumia models did sell very bad. The lunch in US will not change that and even if it’s a success in US its nowhere else and US is only a very small market.
I am going to predict that Elop will not survive this year in Nokia. He will be gone before 2012 ends.
Another episode in the “Microsoft always screwed without remorse its partners in mobile” marathon.
http://www.asymco.com/2011/02/11/in-memoriam-microsofts-previous-st…
Really, it is impressive how systematically they conned everybody for the last twelve years -and keep doing that.
Nortel, Novell, Nokia. Which other company can claim they killed the big 3 No, No, No’s?
The $1 Billion bribe you mean…
and for that they got:
(i) the ability to be non-exclusive to Microsoft,
(ii) the ability to modify WinPhone as they like.
So they are now moving to their own App Store – which they already have for Maemo/Symbian – Ovi.
Don’t be surprised if you find Qt on there too (which Microsoft would deny in their AppStore) as it is a force in Ovi and would allow apps to run on all 3 platforms.
The whole agreement between Nokia and Microsoft was about getting market share for Microsoft at any cost. So it’s no surprise that Nokia would do it in a way that would discourage others getting what benefits them. Ironically it ultimately hurts Microsoft by not allowing for network effects, which has been what Microsoft has always counted on to keep everyone under control.
That’s where they have always been. WinPhone is a dead platform.
Well, not likely the next one; but it’s going to happen at some point if he doesn’t step aside first.
You have no idea what you’re talking about. None. Zero. Nokia isn’t making their own app store. This is just them linking to their specific area of the marketplace which they’ve always had
Obviously you have not clue as they already have their own AppStore.
As I said in a previous story, the other WP OEMs are 99% Android shops, with merely token WP support. Their WP phons are plain looking phones with next to zero-marketing. So, as I said before, who cares what they might be “worried” about? It’s not as if they care all that much, as demonstrated by their actions and attitude.
Samsung for example, in order to sell more, say, Samsung Focus S’s would need to cannibalize its own Samsung Galaxy S II sales. Where the hell is the incentive? That kind of thing never works out in practice.
Nokia on the other hand has gone all in with Windows Phone. Where it saw gaps, it is actively filling them (NFC and mobile wallets, a variety of apps, Vietnamese Keyboard, etc.).
Also, I think some people are reading way too into this change. Who’s to say Microsoft hasn’t allowed OEMs to do this in post-Mango builds, but Nokia’s Market is just the only one in the leaked screenshot? I’d say its too early to jump to conclusions.
Regardless, with the shadow of Windows Phone 8 beginning to cast on this generation, a lot of this seems to be..irrelevant. Most leaked reports seem to indicate WP8 is a lot more carrier and OEM friendly.
And Nokia would be cannibalizing Symbian sales – which it admittedly has wanted to do for a long time, but which customers still prefer over WinPhone.
Or of course their Maemo phone, which when sold in the same market outsells the WinPhone 3:1. Only Nokia management is dumb enough to continue with the WinPhone.
Apple, Microsoft, Google, Nokia, B&N, and Amazon are the only groups out there with Mobile App Markets – 3 for Android (B&N, Amazon, and Google), and one each for Symbian/Maemo, Windows, and iOS.
So I don’t see other OEMs rushing to put their own App stores out there.
That said, Microsoft has typically locked down the App Store to their own, so Nokia is certainly an exception.
What will be telling is if the recent B&N and Microsoft partnership will result in a Windows version of the Nook and B&N’s app store providing apps for it.
Win8 will probably follow the lines of WinPhone7 with regards to App stores. So this is still probably telling of Win8 too.
This isn’t Nokia having their own store, this is Nokia having their own segment of the existing store.
Samsung has one, so does HTC and LG. Even operators have them. So this is likely just a deep link into that store.
Nokia’s agreement gives them a lot more capability to do what they want with WinPhone than any other manufacturer got. So it could be they are using their existing App store (Ovi).
So since they already have their own App Store (Ovi) it’s a top up between which they would use.
Would they segment Ovi to have a Windows portion? Or would they get a segment of Microsoft’s and then have to pay a fee to Microsoft for access to it, etc?
One arrangement benefits Nokia better, while the other benefits Microsoft and the Windows Eco-system better.