Microsoft: We don't care about Windows Phone's market share and here's why

[GoodBytes]

get me a x86 windows phone and im in

What would that give you, beside running a Win32 apps under continuum?

Win32 apps aren't touch friendly, and most of them aren't high DPI aware, making them look blurry on your phone. Let alone they need to be able to be resized to the size (aspect ratio) of a phones. They are many Win32 apps that are non scalable, or have a minimum window size, an issue on the phone as everything runs full screen, and its GUI assumes more width than height, while on a phone, it is the contrary. Most of the time people hold their phone in portrait more, so you have more height than width. Basically, they'll be a mess.

For example, if you take Steam, beside the fact that it is not high DPI aware (not 4K ready), and non-touch screen friendly (can't navigate with touch properly without being frustrating), but you can't scale the program to the size of a phone. The program has a minimum window size not compatible. And say, even if Microsoft forced thing, look at the library, basically, you'll see the library left side column, and the content on the right panel won't be visible, as the list of games on the left can't made smaller, or disappear.

Another issue with Win32 apps, is that many of them aren't designed for mobile systems. Meaning they are very power hungry, because they assume desktop. The whole concept for making software for mobile system where you want it to be power efficient, is all new, many developers don't even know about it. Heck, Chrome is super power hungry on a mobile system, just recently Google made some effort to help diminish the problem, as IE and Firefox had much greater battery life, but they are so much they can quickly do (not to mention that they'll need to trade performance).

[thekeemo]

What would that give you, beside running a Win32 apps under continuum?

Win32 apps aren't touch friendly, and most of them aren't high DPI aware, making them look blurry on your phone. Let alone they need to be able to be resized to the size (aspect ratio) of a phones. They are many Win32 apps that are non scalable, an issue on the phone as everything runs full screen, and its GUI assumes more width than height, while on a phone, it is the contrary. Most of the time people hold their phone in portrait more,so you have more height than width. Basically, they'll be a mess.

Good point.

the scaling issue is the main problem

but with modern resolution the vertical orientation is not an issue since I dont have many issues with 1024x1280

[Nowak]

Except he's made some not so smart decisions. Like making Cortana cross platform and Office cross platform. If he didn't people would have to run Windows desktop or a Windows Phone for it.

Office has always been cross-platform. Hell, the first versions of Word and Excel were released on the Mac first, in 1983 and 1985 (Windows didn't get Office until 1990.) Also, considering Microsoft's size, they basically need to make their services multi-platform, lest they want to be hit with more anti-trust lawsuits.

[GoodBytes]

Good point.

the scaling issue is the main problem

but with modern resolution the vertical orientation is not an issue since I dont have many issues with 1024x1280

Here is a better picture of what I mean:

Notice how I didn't really bother much in getter really the appropriate size, but look how the program is unusable already.

Sure your phone can be 1080x1920, but you have to remember that the DPI size will be much larger, else text would be WAY WAY WAY too small. The point of high DPI, is that elements stays relatively the same size than normal 100% DPI, but you have more pixels for the text/icons/graphics/pictures being displayed allowing you to enjoy a richer experience, and easier to read text.

[thekeemo]

-snip-

oh I agree 99% of programs would be a nightmare. Im just saying that the problem is mainly with stuff being tiny and not stuff being portrait. Consider using win 10 mail it scales fairly well if you don't need the advanced features.

[RH00D]

Except he's made some not so smart decisions. Like making Cortana cross platform and Office cross platform. If he didn't people would have to run Windows desktop or a Windows Phone for it.

 

What's more likely is that they would slowly become irrelevant. Microsoft needs their software to be where the users are and unfortunately on mobile they are overwhelmingly not on Windows. Microsoft needs their software to have presence in the mobile space, that's why they needed to port their apps to Android and iOS to stay relevant.

[abazigal]

Except he's made some not so smart decisions. Like making Cortana cross platform and Office cross platform. If he didn't people would have to run Windows desktop or a Windows Phone for it.

iOS and android devices have gotten on just fine for years without office. The market has spoken - office is nice to have, but it's not the dealbreaker people are making it out to be. People are not jumping on Windows phones just for the questionable value proposition of being able to run Office on their tablets and smartphones.

I think Microsoft is at a crossroads. On one hand, Windows phone is not really getting anywhere while taking up valuable resources and manpower. But it is also a source of pride and Microsoft can't just kill it like that without being the target of much ridicule. So Microsoft likely feels obligated to support it.

On the other hand, I believe Microsoft would very much be content to just continue selling office licenses to as may devices as possible. Who cares if you are running office on a Windows PC or Mac? The money still goes to Microsoft at the end of the day.

The people losing out would be the hardware OEMs, but they aren't really of paramount concern to Microsoft.

[spartaman64]

Well revenue is the most important factor. But with the current market share of Windows Phone, it is unsustainable for Microsoft in the current state.

But I think Satya knows this, but they will try to make bring success with the Surface Phone, so 1 year from now.

And I think they can. The Surface team has proven to be very talented in making interesting product, plus by that time Windows 10 Mobile should be polished OS, and probably Microsoft will make sure that all the core apps for large number of people will be there or mostly there, catering people that are looking for a change from what they use. If Microsoft is able to pull that off, and at least get 5-10% market share, it will be a huge success for the company, and should be sustainable.

well sure i guess to a company that only cares about profit then nothing else matters except revenue. if a company releases a bad phone and price it at 10 billion dollars and 5 billionares buy it is the company successful in the scope of revenue yes but is the product really successful if 5 people bought it

[patrick3027]

You could also have used this as title:

Microsoft CEO says company's smartphone market share is 'unsustainable'

http://www.gsmarena.com/microsoft_ceo_says_companys_smartphone_market_share_unsustainable-news-15816.php

[potoooooooo]

Except he's made some not so smart decisions. Like making Cortana cross platform and Office cross platform. If he didn't people would have to run Windows desktop or a Windows Phone for it.

You know microsoft was forced to make office cross platform...right?

 

That wasn't a decision they could make

[dalekphalm]

well sure i guess to a company that only cares about profit then nothing else matters except revenue. if a company releases a bad phone and price it at 10 billion dollars and 5 billionares buy it is the company successful in the scope of revenue yes but is the product really successful if 5 people bought it

In that context, yes, that would be a successful product.

 

Rating success is almost entirely up to the beholder. In that case, they would have been monetarily successful - and ridiculously so, at that. Whether they had any other metrics that they cared about, is entirely speculative.

[Guest Kloaked]

Except he's made some not so smart decisions. Like making Cortana cross platform and Office cross platform. If he didn't people would have to run Windows desktop or a Windows Phone for it.

 

How is that not a smart decision?

[AlTech]

You know microsoft was forced to make office cross platform...right?

 

That wasn't a decision they could make

 In what way?

[potoooooooo]

 In what way? 

 

They were sued, something about anti trust in relation to internet explorer

 

They made office cross platform in reaction to the internet explorer case to prevent further expensive USA vs. Microsoft lawsuits

[Security]

Except he's made some not so smart decisions. Like making Cortana cross platform and Office cross platform. If he didn't people would have to run Windows desktop or a Windows Phone for it.

 

I agree with MS that there future lies in SAS and not selling loose copies of everything, the free updates of mobile and computer OS' to Windows 10 is an effective way to lure people into the ecosystem. There aim is to have people want to use Office or Cortana no matter what platform they are on, just like people generally always go to Google when they want to look up something. It is where the future lies especially with more and more moving to the cloud. In 10 years most devices will most likely be nothing more then a terminal to a cloud environment for a big part of the world.

 

It means Windows Phones don't really have much going for them. would you buy a windows phone over an android phone based on the fact that you can get Microsoft services on both? No unless you're a fan of Windows Phones. In which case it didn't matter that it was cross platform

 

I went for Blackberry because I preferred the platform over anything else. I didn't really care for apps anyway and the Android app support should (but doesn't as people fear change and want to brag about there 8 core phone or whatever) convince most to make the switch to the clearly superior OS that is BB 10. The interface, the gestures, the support and more makes Android look like a joke and Apple is very busy cloning when they can... So they must be doing something right.

[suicidalfranco]

I agree with MS that there future lies in SAS and not selling loose copies of everything, the free updates of mobile and computer OS' to Windows 10 is an effective way to lure people into the ecosystem. There aim is to have people want to use Office or Cortana no matter what platform they are on, just like people generally always go to Google when they want to look up something. It is where the future lies especially with more and more moving to the cloud. In 10 years most devices will most likely be nothing more then a terminal to a cloud environment for a big part of the world.

 

 

I went for Blackberry because I preferred the platform over anything else. I didn't really care for apps anyway and the Android app support should (but doesn't as people fear change and want to brag about there 8 core phone or whatever) convince most to make the switch to the clearly superior OS that is BB 10. The interface, the gestures, the support and more makes Android look like a joke and Apple is very busy cloning when they can... So they must be doing something right.

BB10: so superior even BlackBerry ditched it for Android :^)