14 ms·

Microsoft to Cut 2,850 More Jobs in Exit from Phone Business

196 points by peterkshultz 10y ago

youdontknowtho 10y ago
I'm really bored with phones. People are weirder about phones than they ever were about pc stuff.
cryptoz 10y ago
Six years ago Microsoft held a funeral for the iPhone, saying that they would have 80% market share and iPhone would have 2%. The main problem is arrogance. http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-iphone-funeral-2010-9 http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-iphone-funeral-2010...
- smaili 10y ago
  The parade included an impromptu marching band of Windows Phone team members, roller skaters, a unicycle, costumes, and a few home-made floats, including a hearse for competitors.
- tn13 10y ago
  You have to do such things to improve moral of your people. There is a good chance we will be saying exact same thing about SolarCity, Tesla, Uber and many others.
  - Gracana 10y ago
    Would that improve your morale? I'd feel like I was in a cult. That is some next-level corporate lunacy.
- asdfologist 10y ago
  That doesn't seem like arrogance to me. "It’s a great way for teams that have worked overtime to create a kick-ass product blow off steam and have a little fun." It's a lighthearted morale booster. What's the big deal?
  - robotresearcher 10y ago
    > What's the big deal? It was tasteless and disrespectful at the time and in retrospect it is laughably hubristic. You can celebrate a good thing without dissing another good thing.
    - macintux 10y ago
      Many of us thought it was laughably hubristic at the time.
  - origami777 10y ago
    Taken alone it could be viewed as light hearted. Taken in the context of their past behavior it's another example of arrogance. Look at what Ballmer said about Google and Eric Sshmidt in the early days. Look at their complete mismanagement of mobile. They always believed they could just swoop in and win the market. How else can you explain the many years after iPhone was launched for them to launch a competitive mobile OS. I would call their approach to mobile an embarrassment. How could the worlds largest software company release such crap for so long? How could they go to market with a confusing array of mobile options (looking at you RT)? They thought they could win just because of past performance, and thus had no sense of urgency or humility, and that is why I think this is arrogant.
- iaw 10y ago
  When Bill Gates was at the helm he skated a fine line of legalities in order to build a sustained monopoly. The ecosystem continued to evolve as his priorities shifted away from Microsoft and none of his replacements were able to adapt as dynamically as Bill did. Ballmer is the pinnacle example of this arrogance without evidence attitude. It's like the ghost of corporate Bill Gates will guide and give luck no matter how stupid the decision they make. It's sad because Microsoft could've evolved gracefully into a behemoth larger than Apple and Google, if only there had been an ounce of humility after Bill Gates left.
  - angstrom 10y ago
    As it stands Microsoft has basically become a staple commodity. Like proctor & gamble peddling soap products Microsoft peddles products for small/medium corporations. Xbox is the only thing keeping a foothold in the consumer space anymore. But they continue to make predictable money at it.
    - linkregister 10y ago
      Microsoft Windows is still the most-installed OS by far in the consumer desktop and laptop space. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_systems#Desktop_and_laptop_computers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_syste...
    - pcwalton 10y ago
      Despite the way it seems living in San Francisco, Apple's market share on desktop is under 10% (via browsing statistics). And Linux and Chrome OS have nearly an order of magnitude less market share. Windows is still, for all intents and purposes, completely dominant.
      - pjmlp 10y ago
        Regarding ChromeOS I never saw them here in Europe besides occasionall units at big surface stores. And they usually stay there for weeks before they vanish. It is quite easy to check if it is the same one, if they don't lock it. I never saw any trace of the success they appear to have in US.
- LA_Banker 10y ago
  You say "is" as though they haven't changed CEO's, undergone a complete organization rehaul, and oriented toward cloud services in the ensuing six years.
  - rezashirazian 10y ago
    This is a very good point. These are the fruits of past coming to bear, it would be interesting to see where Microsoft ends up in a few years with Satya Nadella
  - GrumpyYoungMan 10y ago
    Not quite. Terry Myerson was the head of the Windows Phone division at the time of that parade and its subsequent failure in the market and Terry Myerson is now in charge of the entire Windows division, including desktop (i.e. Windows 10) and mobile devices. (minor edit for clarification)
    - chj 10y ago
      This, I can never understand.
    - xenadu02 10y ago
      That's because the Windows division is in "milk it and wind it down mode". Windows is no longer the favored child so they need some rube to keep the gravy train running as they pivot everyone else to the next big thing. Windows won't go away but will just become less relevant. I doubt Microsoft even cares if Apple takes 80% marketshare in desktop/laptop PCs... as long as people keep buying Office licenses and using services running on Azure they'll make a ton of money and everyone wins. The mobile race is over. Apple and Google won, we are way too far along in the hockey stick graph to leave any oxygen for further competitors. The only question left for anyone else is how much money they want to lose before they give up.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- lojack 10y ago
  If I was holding MSFT stock and they didn't have grand ambitions or shoot for the stars, I'd sell. Same goes for most companies.
Fej 10y ago
A long time coming. Microsoft failed to capitalize on smartphones before Apple and Google and now they're paying the price. That's their perennial problem. They had an app market, smartphones, tablets... before the above, but they couldn't figure out how to sell them. They could have been Apple.
- bobajeff 10y ago
  >They could have been Apple. Not really. What we called apps/smartphones/tablets before the iPhone/iPad was not really the same thing.
  - zbyte64 10y ago
    Bingo. To Microsoft tablets were just larger PDAs meant for answering emails.
    - josteink 10y ago
      On what planet does this statement ring true? Microsoft were the first to release Windows as a full on tablet-OS, at least half a decade before before even the iPhone existed. Forget about the iPad. That was at least 10 years later. Microsoft delivered a full version of Windows XP (which was what was current at the time), capable of running all Windows software. No emulation. No limitations. The problem was that most Windows software weren't really nice to run on a tablet, so the platform had limited appeal. Besides that you had the hardware issue: A "tablet" at that time was at least as heavy as a laptop. It was way before its time, and as such, was doomed to fail. But don't come and claim Microsoft foresaw tablets as a platform for limited capability computing for answering emails only and such. That's what Apple delivered. Microsoft had the right vision, and they were willing to execute. It's a shame it didn't turn out better.
  - rmason 10y ago
    I had a Palm phone in 2001. They didn't call it a smartphone back then, but I had Internet and some small apps for weather and news. It was sort of like the Internet before the web, it was something only a geek would love. Weighed five pounds, ran hot and you needed a stylus to interact with it. Palm should have owned the smartphone era but they didn't have a vision where it should go. Steve Jobs did, he set standards and didn't ship until they were reached, end of story.
doomlaser 10y ago
Steve Ballmer's infamous remarks on competition with Apple, after the iPhone announcement in 2007: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eywi0h_Y5_U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eywi0h_Y5_U "Let's take phones first. Right now, we're selling millions and millions and millions of phones a year. Apple is selling zero phones a year. In six months, they'll have the most expensive phone by far ever in the marketplace, and, let's see." Times change.
- Alex3917 10y ago
  And he was right, they had to substantially lower the price almost immediately.
  - zbyte64 10y ago
    And also lacked a keyboard. I mean how do you check your email without a keyboard?!?
    - Ezhik 10y ago
      I understand why people reacted the way they did. Honestly, when iPhone first came out it was pretty much a toy. No apps? Even dumbphones could run J2ME stuff! It's only when iPhones got the App Store that things got serious. But anyone who didn't see the danger of that "toy" running actual apps, or didn't see the need to revamp their user interface to beat, ended up losing.
      - hughw 10y ago
        iPhone was great before apps. The full featured touch browser was a revelation. You could look up anything, from anywhere. I still spend 70% of my time in the iPhone browser, not in apps.
      - stouset 10y ago
        By "reacted the way they did" you mean "bought all of them as they hit the shelves"? Apple captured 20% of the smartphone market the first quarter the iPhone was released, outselling Nokia, Palm, and Motorola combined. Nobody was seemingly all that upset they couldn't play yet another crappy J2ME version of "snake" that took 45 seconds to load. Roughly 0% of consumers knew what the hell J2ME even was. They did, however, see a cell phone with an actual web browser instead of some low-res, Javascriptless WAP disappointment. Not to mention a YouTube client and a decent camera plus photo app.
dvcc 10y ago
I really wish the WP7 idea was fully executed, it seemed like they abandoned the Metro idea midway. I feel like Metro (errr... ModernUI?) was a design language that needed and still needs and all or nothing commitment otherwise it ends up looking like Windows 8, a bit childish. The lack of commitment to the design language and awful app adoption really killed it. Disappointing to watch.
jtrip 10y ago
The best part, Nokia gets shafted in all of this. Nokia got dragged along in this clown show and we lose out on getting great hardware. Not to mention the software side of things that drowned as Nokia got torpedoed. Here's hoping they can rise from the ashes again. Maybe their spin off services like here maps are a sign of life. Edit: Maybe I speak from a position of ignorance about the industry. But I also remember thinking how greatly awesome it would have been if I could run Android on the new Lumia hardware. I also remember the fact that Nokia was worth 30 bn before the new ceo, ex microsoft employee, came in and within years it was left worth 9 bn; pop culture facts I suppose.
- sverige 10y ago
  Yeah, they really screwed that up. RIP Nokia.
- honkhonkpants 10y ago
  Nokia's software was garbage before and after Microsoft.
  - nickysielicki 10y ago
    Sure, but their hardware was always great and their software could have been Android. Look at HTC. What do they do besides great hardware? In the early days of Android, they were the go-to vendor for a close-to-stock Android experience. That could have been Nokia. Now HTC is making the best VR headset and has a fairly bright future.
    - Analemma_ 10y ago
      > Look at HTC. What do they do besides great hardware? I'm looking at HTC - what I see is a company that did great with Android for a short while, then got chewed up as Apple and Samsung ran away with the high end of the market while the Chinese manufacturers gobbled up the bottom end. All the "Nokia should've gone with Android!" comments I see around the internet never try to explain how they think Nokia would've fared any better than HTC (or Sony, or Motorola). > Now HTC is making the best VR headset and has a fairly bright future. You and I see HTC's future very differently. The Vive is the thread they're hanging by, and as soon as Valve doesn't need them anymore, it's going to be over (http://arstechnica.co.uk/gadgets/2016/07/can-we-stop-pretending-htc-has-a-future-in-vr/ http://arstechnica.co.uk/gadgets/2016/07/can-we-stop-pretend...)
Gustomaximus 10y ago
I'm amazed MS have dont this with before a genuine attempt at phone that docks and becomes your PVC. Microsoft are so well placed to create and distribute what is bound to become a popular from factor. This would work on so many levels. The light-weight basic consumer that doesn't need a gaming/ or other high power rig at home. Developing countries where people can't afford a laptop and high-end phone could now get a phone plus a screen/keyboard at home. And the biggest sell is at the enterprise level. Companies could issue phones only and have a heap of docking stations. It wouldn't suit everyone but many would. Time to re-visit Ubuntu Touch and see how they are getting along I guess.
- LA_Banker 10y ago
  >Microsoft are so well placed to create and distribute what is bound to become a popular from factor. There already is a popular form factor that companies issue, and folks in developing countries purchase (in addition to us on HN): the smartphone. If you're not intensely inputting typed data, there's no need for a keyboard. And if you are, then likely your company issues/reimburses-for a device with a keyboard. But otherwise, this is why smartphones are ubiquitous. Many more people are content consumers than content creators.
  - RussianCow 10y ago
    And for those who want a bigger screen, a tablet works just fine. Assuming both your phone and tablet have the same OS, most things should be automatically synced between the two.
- bluedevilzn 10y ago
  They did this already. http://www.theverge.com/2015/4/29/8513519/microsoft-windows-10-continuum-for-phones http://www.theverge.com/2015/4/29/8513519/microsoft-windows-...
  - imaginenore 10y ago
    I don't want some simulation, I want the same OS running on my phone. Phones have been powerful enough for a while to run real OSs.
st3fan 10y ago
When did they Exit from the Phone Business? Did that actually happen? I think Microsoft Stores still showcase Windows Phones?
- joeblau 10y ago
  They announced it back in May [1], but there was speculation that they were exiting the phone business late last year. I think they still make 2 flagship phones, but they aren't competing with iPhone/iOS or (10,000+ phones)/Android anymore. [1] - http://www.macrumors.com/2016/05/25/microsoft-calls-time-consumer-phone-business/ http://www.macrumors.com/2016/05/25/microsoft-calls-time-con...
- WorldMaker 10y ago
  In the DNA for Microsoft the company has long felt that it isn't a hardware company and the sole reasons for Microsoft to do hardware are to act as a leading beacon for its hardware partners to follow (Microsoft made mice to help spur the adoption of the mouse wheel and keyboards to spur usage of research in ergonomics; the Surface line explores interesting form factors outside of the "PC norm"). From that standpoint it is unsurprising that Microsoft hasn't seen a need for most/all of the hardware business they bought from Nokia. Maybe Microsoft doesn't see a need to try to be a "leading beacon" in the phone hardware space because there isn't interesting innovation to be had there right now. It does not seem to mean that Microsoft is out of the Phone software business. (It may even mean that they've found new hardware partners they are excited about working with.) A lot of the effort into Windows 10 and the UWP app platform has been to bridge the gaps, merge the teams, and make sure that Microsoft can continue to run the Phone software business even as a "low margin" business unit (even with relatively spare hardware sales), and leverage synergies between phone software work and other semi-related platforms like HoloLens and Xbox.
alxmdev 10y ago
Article says Android and iOS have 84% and 15% respectively of the market. It's still hard to sink in the fact of how strong a duopoly the mobile market is. All of WP, Blackberry, Ubuntu, Sailfish, Tizen, and probably more, all share the same 1%!
- dexwiz 10y ago
  It's the lack of an app market. Why by hardware that only supports a fraction of the software? Yes, most apps are crap, but for most app developers, anything after Apple and Android are an afterthought.
  - ocdtrekkie 10y ago
    The chicken and egg problem: Developers won't support your platform unless you have enough users. Users won't buy your platform unless you have enough apps. More than once companies including Microsoft have tried to break this issue by outright buying developers, but the monopoly effect is way too strong. A third party platform will fundamentally need to beat Android so badly on platform features directly that app developers rush to it, users get excited about it. The hype has to be real. Maybe that's HoloLens for Microsoft, maybe it's someone else. But the admittedly incremental benefits Windows Mobile has over Android aren't enough to break that monopoly power. Nothing about Tizen, Ubuntu, Sailfish, etc. gets people talking about the cool amazing future of technology.
    - dexwiz 10y ago
      It will have to be a new platform. VR is the likely next candidate. But I don't think we will see widespread adoption until the units are self contained.
  - colmvp 10y ago
    The funny thing is that even myself as a techie/dev, I only use a handful of apps.
- kansface 10y ago
  > It's still hard to sink in the fact of how strong a duopoly the mobile market is. My understanding is that most? markets function this way? Perhaps someone has some numbers...
dingo_bat 10y ago
I don't care about Microsoft, but it's a real shame what happened to Nokia. The phones were rugged, feature packed and were willing to sacrifice form in order to gain function. They had thick, chunky phones just so the battery life would be awesome.
- shmerl 10y ago
  Jolla is the only thing that's left of that Nokia.
  - ommunist 10y ago
    Not the only! Yota2 phone with second e-ink screen on the back of the phone is engineered by former nokians.
    - aedron 10y ago
      It's a really cool idea, the design is a big letdown for me though.
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ocdtrekkie 10y ago
It's sad if this happens, because I bought a used two year old Windows Phone, and it's more pleasant to use than any phone on the market today. And given that it gets updates the same day as desktop PCs, and doesn't wait for any manufacturer or carrier approvals, is probably one of the most secure. On my carrier, Verizon, we have almost no choices. There's iPhone, there's three dozen identical Android phones with different brand names, and a couple two year old Windows Phones. Not a lot of choice in the market now, and certainly not going to get any better if Microsoft exits.
- slouch 10y ago
  It takes a lot of research to find the winners. I just bought another brand new Sony Xperia Z3 Compact for 220$ because the newer Z5 Compact doesn't compare well for being double the price.
- biocomputation 10y ago
  Also a Windows phone user, and I totally agree. It's sort of amazing how nice it is to use. Super fast startup time, super fast performance, very smooth user experience. Great camera. Not many apps, but that's not a big deal for me. I truly believe a lot of people would switch if they spent a week on one, but that is never gonna happen.
seesomesense 10y ago
Branding them "Windows" phones was the kiss of death. Almost every adult has had terrible experiences with Windows. The young view Windows as something their grandparents used. Calling it anything else would have been better.Even "Electric Candy" phones would have been more attractive than "Windows" phones. I understand that the phones were reasonably decent.
- rogerbinns 10y ago
  They also tried (to some degree) your suggestion. Remember Microsoft Kin? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Kin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Kin | Kin was a short-lived mobile phone line from Microsoft designed for users of social networking. Microsoft described the phones' target demographic as men and women between ages 15 and 30.
  - xufi 10y ago
    I actually thought that was a cool idea when it came out but I always did wonder what the purpose was if I wanted to do more. I was pretty focused on getting a Blackberry (shudders) at the time
- slouch 10y ago
  "xbox mobile"
- city41 10y ago
  I really liked my windows phone a lot. Honestly a lot more than my current iPhone 6. But I need to use second factor apps to log into my company's vpn, and those apps aren't on winphones.
  - WorldMaker 10y ago
    If it supports the OATH/IETF RFC standards (and almost all two factor systems do/should), the Authenticator app that comes preinstalled with Windows phone supports it right out of the box. (Your company's VPN administrator just may not realize that.) The interesting irony recently is that my own company just sent an email encouraging our VPN users to download the (very same) Microsoft Authenticator on iOS and Android as it is now the most reliable cross-platform 2FA app.
ljk 10y ago
the day after the intern event with Seattle Center rented out for a private concert...
- steve-howard 10y ago
  You realize they do that every summer and it's part of their recruitment pipeline?
samfisher83 10y ago
Nokia went from the biggest cell phone maker in the world to being gone in less than 10 years. Tech is pretty unforgiving.
- colmvp 10y ago
  In 2006, if you were to make the prediction that Nokia, a company generating 41B in global sales, would be gone in a decade, you'd be downvoted to oblivion.
  - FLGMwt 10y ago
    Throwing this up here not because I believe it but because I want to be that guy that everyone harkens back to in the ludicrous chance it does happen: Ditto Apple. :P
  - rhblake 10y ago
    Gone from the cell phone business, sure, but certainly not gone as a company. Big in telco equipment. After acquiring Alcatel-Lucent, I note that Nokia now has roughly the same amount of employees as Microsoft...
    - pjmlp 10y ago
      And closed most of their European units moving them to cheaper countries.... That is what makes me angry at them, not whatever they did later with Microsoft.
- ocdtrekkie 10y ago
  On the other hand, BlackBerry has hung on like there's no tomorrow. It's still around! Why? Who knows. But it's here long past the time that it's been the butt of jokes.
cbanek 10y ago
I guess now my Windows Phone SWAG flashlight that I got when working there is now a collectors edition. I remember when we all saw the iPhone. A lot of us knew we were in trouble when the execs kept going on about how only "enterprise customers" need a smartphone, and how it's about selling Microsoft Exchange...
peter303 10y ago
Nadella has been cleaning up Ballmer's poop. That will make Microsoft stronger some day.
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hoi 10y ago
Actually, Nokia Software was awesome. It was their usability and UX that was dog awful. A lot of SW features that are around today have been around for a decade with Nokia. They had a plan, to move over to Meego, which won awards.. but was torpedoed by Elop. Elop destroyed Nokia, they had the best distribution network and supply chains. Linking up with Elop instantly killed that and destroyed any goodwill they had with operators and carriers who would have continued to back Nokia. Unfortunately carriers are anti-Microsoft...
- wvenable 10y ago
  > Nokia Software was awesome Symbian, their bread and butter, was awful from beginning to end. The burning platform memo from Elop was entirely right. Microsoft could have been a strong 3 player but they kept rebooting their platform ever 6 months.
  - robin_reala 10y ago
    Not from beginning, as the beginnings of Symbian was EPOC which was great.
    - scottdupoy 10y ago
      Electronic piece of cheese! Symbian OS was very capable, full of features, but hard for developers to pick up and work with. I remember when the iPhone first came out and Symbian developers couldn't believe how few features it had ("it doesn't even multi-task!") but it did absolutely nail the user interface which is what most people noticed. As a friend working at Symbian once said to me, "it was like watching a train crash in slow motion"
    - wvenable 10y ago
      EPOC was designed for far less capable hardware than even pre-iPhone smartphones. It allowed for a lot of capability on those early Psion devices. But in modern hardware it was too fiddly and too alien (non-standard C++). Microsoft always understood the consequences of Moore's law. Palm killed them early on because Windows Mobile was just too much OS for those early devices. But as hardware improved, Palm was left with a less capable OS and Microsoft was ready. What they weren't ready for was Apple porting their desktop OS to mobile.
jrnichols 10y ago
I'm a long time Linux and Mac user, but over the past few years I've viewed Microsoft as more of an ally... and a company that has so much potential to do new and awesome things, but they just don't seem to know where to go. They seem to be missing an opportunity to make a pretty great ecosystem with the Xbox, Skype, Windows Phone, and Windows 10. I've played with the Windows Phone at a new retail store and really liked it. I'm almost wondering if they had gone for the retail stores earlier on if the tide might have gone their way just a little bit more.

196 points by peterkshultz 10y ago

I'm really bored with phones. People are weirder about phones than they ever were about pc stuff.

Six years ago Microsoft held a funeral for the iPhone, saying that they would have 80% market share and iPhone would have 2%. The main problem is arrogance. http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-iphone-funeral-2010-9 http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-iphone-funeral-2010...

smaili 10y ago
The parade included an impromptu marching band of Windows Phone team members, roller skaters, a unicycle, costumes, and a few home-made floats, including a hearse for competitors.
tn13 10y ago
You have to do such things to improve moral of your people. There is a good chance we will be saying exact same thing about SolarCity, Tesla, Uber and many others.
- Gracana 10y ago
  Would that improve your morale? I'd feel like I was in a cult. That is some next-level corporate lunacy.
asdfologist 10y ago
That doesn't seem like arrogance to me. "It’s a great way for teams that have worked overtime to create a kick-ass product blow off steam and have a little fun." It's a lighthearted morale booster. What's the big deal?
- robotresearcher 10y ago
  > What's the big deal? It was tasteless and disrespectful at the time and in retrospect it is laughably hubristic. You can celebrate a good thing without dissing another good thing.
  - macintux 10y ago
    Many of us thought it was laughably hubristic at the time.
- origami777 10y ago
  Taken alone it could be viewed as light hearted. Taken in the context of their past behavior it's another example of arrogance. Look at what Ballmer said about Google and Eric Sshmidt in the early days. Look at their complete mismanagement of mobile. They always believed they could just swoop in and win the market. How else can you explain the many years after iPhone was launched for them to launch a competitive mobile OS. I would call their approach to mobile an embarrassment. How could the worlds largest software company release such crap for so long? How could they go to market with a confusing array of mobile options (looking at you RT)? They thought they could win just because of past performance, and thus had no sense of urgency or humility, and that is why I think this is arrogant.
iaw 10y ago
When Bill Gates was at the helm he skated a fine line of legalities in order to build a sustained monopoly. The ecosystem continued to evolve as his priorities shifted away from Microsoft and none of his replacements were able to adapt as dynamically as Bill did. Ballmer is the pinnacle example of this arrogance without evidence attitude. It's like the ghost of corporate Bill Gates will guide and give luck no matter how stupid the decision they make. It's sad because Microsoft could've evolved gracefully into a behemoth larger than Apple and Google, if only there had been an ounce of humility after Bill Gates left.
- angstrom 10y ago
  As it stands Microsoft has basically become a staple commodity. Like proctor & gamble peddling soap products Microsoft peddles products for small/medium corporations. Xbox is the only thing keeping a foothold in the consumer space anymore. But they continue to make predictable money at it.
  - linkregister 10y ago
    Microsoft Windows is still the most-installed OS by far in the consumer desktop and laptop space. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_systems#Desktop_and_laptop_computers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_syste...
  - pcwalton 10y ago
    Despite the way it seems living in San Francisco, Apple's market share on desktop is under 10% (via browsing statistics). And Linux and Chrome OS have nearly an order of magnitude less market share. Windows is still, for all intents and purposes, completely dominant.
    - pjmlp 10y ago
      Regarding ChromeOS I never saw them here in Europe besides occasionall units at big surface stores. And they usually stay there for weeks before they vanish. It is quite easy to check if it is the same one, if they don't lock it. I never saw any trace of the success they appear to have in US.
LA_Banker 10y ago
You say "is" as though they haven't changed CEO's, undergone a complete organization rehaul, and oriented toward cloud services in the ensuing six years.
- rezashirazian 10y ago
  This is a very good point. These are the fruits of past coming to bear, it would be interesting to see where Microsoft ends up in a few years with Satya Nadella
- GrumpyYoungMan 10y ago
  Not quite. Terry Myerson was the head of the Windows Phone division at the time of that parade and its subsequent failure in the market and Terry Myerson is now in charge of the entire Windows division, including desktop (i.e. Windows 10) and mobile devices. (minor edit for clarification)
  - chj 10y ago
    This, I can never understand.
  - xenadu02 10y ago
    That's because the Windows division is in "milk it and wind it down mode". Windows is no longer the favored child so they need some rube to keep the gravy train running as they pivot everyone else to the next big thing. Windows won't go away but will just become less relevant. I doubt Microsoft even cares if Apple takes 80% marketshare in desktop/laptop PCs... as long as people keep buying Office licenses and using services running on Azure they'll make a ton of money and everyone wins. The mobile race is over. Apple and Google won, we are way too far along in the hockey stick graph to leave any oxygen for further competitors. The only question left for anyone else is how much money they want to lose before they give up.
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lojack 10y ago
If I was holding MSFT stock and they didn't have grand ambitions or shoot for the stars, I'd sell. Same goes for most companies.

Fej 10y ago

A long time coming. Microsoft failed to capitalize on smartphones before Apple and Google and now they're paying the price. That's their perennial problem. They had an app market, smartphones, tablets... before the above, but they couldn't figure out how to sell them. They could have been Apple.

bobajeff 10y ago
>They could have been Apple. Not really. What we called apps/smartphones/tablets before the iPhone/iPad was not really the same thing.
- zbyte64 10y ago
  Bingo. To Microsoft tablets were just larger PDAs meant for answering emails.
  - josteink 10y ago
    On what planet does this statement ring true? Microsoft were the first to release Windows as a full on tablet-OS, at least half a decade before before even the iPhone existed. Forget about the iPad. That was at least 10 years later. Microsoft delivered a full version of Windows XP (which was what was current at the time), capable of running all Windows software. No emulation. No limitations. The problem was that most Windows software weren't really nice to run on a tablet, so the platform had limited appeal. Besides that you had the hardware issue: A "tablet" at that time was at least as heavy as a laptop. It was way before its time, and as such, was doomed to fail. But don't come and claim Microsoft foresaw tablets as a platform for limited capability computing for answering emails only and such. That's what Apple delivered. Microsoft had the right vision, and they were willing to execute. It's a shame it didn't turn out better.
- rmason 10y ago
  I had a Palm phone in 2001. They didn't call it a smartphone back then, but I had Internet and some small apps for weather and news. It was sort of like the Internet before the web, it was something only a geek would love. Weighed five pounds, ran hot and you needed a stylus to interact with it. Palm should have owned the smartphone era but they didn't have a vision where it should go. Steve Jobs did, he set standards and didn't ship until they were reached, end of story.

doomlaser 10y ago

Steve Ballmer's infamous remarks on competition with Apple, after the iPhone announcement in 2007: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eywi0h_Y5_U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eywi0h_Y5_U "Let's take phones first. Right now, we're selling millions and millions and millions of phones a year. Apple is selling zero phones a year. In six months, they'll have the most expensive phone by far ever in the marketplace, and, let's see." Times change.

Alex3917 10y ago
And he was right, they had to substantially lower the price almost immediately.
- zbyte64 10y ago
  And also lacked a keyboard. I mean how do you check your email without a keyboard?!?
  - Ezhik 10y ago
    I understand why people reacted the way they did. Honestly, when iPhone first came out it was pretty much a toy. No apps? Even dumbphones could run J2ME stuff! It's only when iPhones got the App Store that things got serious. But anyone who didn't see the danger of that "toy" running actual apps, or didn't see the need to revamp their user interface to beat, ended up losing.
    - hughw 10y ago
      iPhone was great before apps. The full featured touch browser was a revelation. You could look up anything, from anywhere. I still spend 70% of my time in the iPhone browser, not in apps.
    - stouset 10y ago
      By "reacted the way they did" you mean "bought all of them as they hit the shelves"? Apple captured 20% of the smartphone market the first quarter the iPhone was released, outselling Nokia, Palm, and Motorola combined. Nobody was seemingly all that upset they couldn't play yet another crappy J2ME version of "snake" that took 45 seconds to load. Roughly 0% of consumers knew what the hell J2ME even was. They did, however, see a cell phone with an actual web browser instead of some low-res, Javascriptless WAP disappointment. Not to mention a YouTube client and a decent camera plus photo app.

dvcc 10y ago

I really wish the WP7 idea was fully executed, it seemed like they abandoned the Metro idea midway. I feel like Metro (errr... ModernUI?) was a design language that needed and still needs and all or nothing commitment otherwise it ends up looking like Windows 8, a bit childish. The lack of commitment to the design language and awful app adoption really killed it. Disappointing to watch.

jtrip 10y ago

The best part, Nokia gets shafted in all of this. Nokia got dragged along in this clown show and we lose out on getting great hardware. Not to mention the software side of things that drowned as Nokia got torpedoed. Here's hoping they can rise from the ashes again. Maybe their spin off services like here maps are a sign of life. Edit: Maybe I speak from a position of ignorance about the industry. But I also remember thinking how greatly awesome it would have been if I could run Android on the new Lumia hardware. I also remember the fact that Nokia was worth 30 bn before the new ceo, ex microsoft employee, came in and within years it was left worth 9 bn; pop culture facts I suppose.

sverige 10y ago
Yeah, they really screwed that up. RIP Nokia.
honkhonkpants 10y ago
Nokia's software was garbage before and after Microsoft.
- nickysielicki 10y ago
  Sure, but their hardware was always great and their software could have been Android. Look at HTC. What do they do besides great hardware? In the early days of Android, they were the go-to vendor for a close-to-stock Android experience. That could have been Nokia. Now HTC is making the best VR headset and has a fairly bright future.
  - Analemma_ 10y ago
    > Look at HTC. What do they do besides great hardware? I'm looking at HTC - what I see is a company that did great with Android for a short while, then got chewed up as Apple and Samsung ran away with the high end of the market while the Chinese manufacturers gobbled up the bottom end. All the "Nokia should've gone with Android!" comments I see around the internet never try to explain how they think Nokia would've fared any better than HTC (or Sony, or Motorola). > Now HTC is making the best VR headset and has a fairly bright future. You and I see HTC's future very differently. The Vive is the thread they're hanging by, and as soon as Valve doesn't need them anymore, it's going to be over (http://arstechnica.co.uk/gadgets/2016/07/can-we-stop-pretending-htc-has-a-future-in-vr/ http://arstechnica.co.uk/gadgets/2016/07/can-we-stop-pretend...)

Gustomaximus 10y ago

I'm amazed MS have dont this with before a genuine attempt at phone that docks and becomes your PVC. Microsoft are so well placed to create and distribute what is bound to become a popular from factor. This would work on so many levels. The light-weight basic consumer that doesn't need a gaming/ or other high power rig at home. Developing countries where people can't afford a laptop and high-end phone could now get a phone plus a screen/keyboard at home. And the biggest sell is at the enterprise level. Companies could issue phones only and have a heap of docking stations. It wouldn't suit everyone but many would. Time to re-visit Ubuntu Touch and see how they are getting along I guess.

LA_Banker 10y ago
>Microsoft are so well placed to create and distribute what is bound to become a popular from factor. There already is a popular form factor that companies issue, and folks in developing countries purchase (in addition to us on HN): the smartphone. If you're not intensely inputting typed data, there's no need for a keyboard. And if you are, then likely your company issues/reimburses-for a device with a keyboard. But otherwise, this is why smartphones are ubiquitous. Many more people are content consumers than content creators.
- RussianCow 10y ago
  And for those who want a bigger screen, a tablet works just fine. Assuming both your phone and tablet have the same OS, most things should be automatically synced between the two.
bluedevilzn 10y ago
They did this already. http://www.theverge.com/2015/4/29/8513519/microsoft-windows-10-continuum-for-phones http://www.theverge.com/2015/4/29/8513519/microsoft-windows-...
- imaginenore 10y ago
  I don't want some simulation, I want the same OS running on my phone. Phones have been powerful enough for a while to run real OSs.

st3fan 10y ago

When did they Exit from the Phone Business? Did that actually happen? I think Microsoft Stores still showcase Windows Phones?

joeblau 10y ago
They announced it back in May [1], but there was speculation that they were exiting the phone business late last year. I think they still make 2 flagship phones, but they aren't competing with iPhone/iOS or (10,000+ phones)/Android anymore. [1] - http://www.macrumors.com/2016/05/25/microsoft-calls-time-consumer-phone-business/ http://www.macrumors.com/2016/05/25/microsoft-calls-time-con...
WorldMaker 10y ago
In the DNA for Microsoft the company has long felt that it isn't a hardware company and the sole reasons for Microsoft to do hardware are to act as a leading beacon for its hardware partners to follow (Microsoft made mice to help spur the adoption of the mouse wheel and keyboards to spur usage of research in ergonomics; the Surface line explores interesting form factors outside of the "PC norm"). From that standpoint it is unsurprising that Microsoft hasn't seen a need for most/all of the hardware business they bought from Nokia. Maybe Microsoft doesn't see a need to try to be a "leading beacon" in the phone hardware space because there isn't interesting innovation to be had there right now. It does not seem to mean that Microsoft is out of the Phone software business. (It may even mean that they've found new hardware partners they are excited about working with.) A lot of the effort into Windows 10 and the UWP app platform has been to bridge the gaps, merge the teams, and make sure that Microsoft can continue to run the Phone software business even as a "low margin" business unit (even with relatively spare hardware sales), and leverage synergies between phone software work and other semi-related platforms like HoloLens and Xbox.

alxmdev 10y ago

Article says Android and iOS have 84% and 15% respectively of the market. It's still hard to sink in the fact of how strong a duopoly the mobile market is. All of WP, Blackberry, Ubuntu, Sailfish, Tizen, and probably more, all share the same 1%!

dexwiz 10y ago
It's the lack of an app market. Why by hardware that only supports a fraction of the software? Yes, most apps are crap, but for most app developers, anything after Apple and Android are an afterthought.
- ocdtrekkie 10y ago
  The chicken and egg problem: Developers won't support your platform unless you have enough users. Users won't buy your platform unless you have enough apps. More than once companies including Microsoft have tried to break this issue by outright buying developers, but the monopoly effect is way too strong. A third party platform will fundamentally need to beat Android so badly on platform features directly that app developers rush to it, users get excited about it. The hype has to be real. Maybe that's HoloLens for Microsoft, maybe it's someone else. But the admittedly incremental benefits Windows Mobile has over Android aren't enough to break that monopoly power. Nothing about Tizen, Ubuntu, Sailfish, etc. gets people talking about the cool amazing future of technology.
  - dexwiz 10y ago
    It will have to be a new platform. VR is the likely next candidate. But I don't think we will see widespread adoption until the units are self contained.
- colmvp 10y ago
  The funny thing is that even myself as a techie/dev, I only use a handful of apps.
kansface 10y ago
> It's still hard to sink in the fact of how strong a duopoly the mobile market is. My understanding is that most? markets function this way? Perhaps someone has some numbers...

dingo_bat 10y ago

I don't care about Microsoft, but it's a real shame what happened to Nokia. The phones were rugged, feature packed and were willing to sacrifice form in order to gain function. They had thick, chunky phones just so the battery life would be awesome.

shmerl 10y ago
Jolla is the only thing that's left of that Nokia.
- ommunist 10y ago
  Not the only! Yota2 phone with second e-ink screen on the back of the phone is engineered by former nokians.
  - aedron 10y ago
    It's a really cool idea, the design is a big letdown for me though.

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ocdtrekkie 10y ago

It's sad if this happens, because I bought a used two year old Windows Phone, and it's more pleasant to use than any phone on the market today. And given that it gets updates the same day as desktop PCs, and doesn't wait for any manufacturer or carrier approvals, is probably one of the most secure. On my carrier, Verizon, we have almost no choices. There's iPhone, there's three dozen identical Android phones with different brand names, and a couple two year old Windows Phones. Not a lot of choice in the market now, and certainly not going to get any better if Microsoft exits.

slouch 10y ago
It takes a lot of research to find the winners. I just bought another brand new Sony Xperia Z3 Compact for 220$ because the newer Z5 Compact doesn't compare well for being double the price.
biocomputation 10y ago
Also a Windows phone user, and I totally agree. It's sort of amazing how nice it is to use. Super fast startup time, super fast performance, very smooth user experience. Great camera. Not many apps, but that's not a big deal for me. I truly believe a lot of people would switch if they spent a week on one, but that is never gonna happen.

seesomesense 10y ago

Branding them "Windows" phones was the kiss of death. Almost every adult has had terrible experiences with Windows. The young view Windows as something their grandparents used. Calling it anything else would have been better.Even "Electric Candy" phones would have been more attractive than "Windows" phones. I understand that the phones were reasonably decent.

rogerbinns 10y ago
They also tried (to some degree) your suggestion. Remember Microsoft Kin? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Kin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Kin | Kin was a short-lived mobile phone line from Microsoft designed for users of social networking. Microsoft described the phones' target demographic as men and women between ages 15 and 30.
- xufi 10y ago
  I actually thought that was a cool idea when it came out but I always did wonder what the purpose was if I wanted to do more. I was pretty focused on getting a Blackberry (shudders) at the time
slouch 10y ago
"xbox mobile"
city41 10y ago
I really liked my windows phone a lot. Honestly a lot more than my current iPhone 6. But I need to use second factor apps to log into my company's vpn, and those apps aren't on winphones.
- WorldMaker 10y ago
  If it supports the OATH/IETF RFC standards (and almost all two factor systems do/should), the Authenticator app that comes preinstalled with Windows phone supports it right out of the box. (Your company's VPN administrator just may not realize that.) The interesting irony recently is that my own company just sent an email encouraging our VPN users to download the (very same) Microsoft Authenticator on iOS and Android as it is now the most reliable cross-platform 2FA app.

ljk 10y ago

the day after the intern event with Seattle Center rented out for a private concert...

steve-howard 10y ago
You realize they do that every summer and it's part of their recruitment pipeline?

samfisher83 10y ago

Nokia went from the biggest cell phone maker in the world to being gone in less than 10 years. Tech is pretty unforgiving.

colmvp 10y ago
In 2006, if you were to make the prediction that Nokia, a company generating 41B in global sales, would be gone in a decade, you'd be downvoted to oblivion.
- FLGMwt 10y ago
  Throwing this up here not because I believe it but because I want to be that guy that everyone harkens back to in the ludicrous chance it does happen: Ditto Apple. :P
- rhblake 10y ago
  Gone from the cell phone business, sure, but certainly not gone as a company. Big in telco equipment. After acquiring Alcatel-Lucent, I note that Nokia now has roughly the same amount of employees as Microsoft...
  - pjmlp 10y ago
    And closed most of their European units moving them to cheaper countries.... That is what makes me angry at them, not whatever they did later with Microsoft.
ocdtrekkie 10y ago
On the other hand, BlackBerry has hung on like there's no tomorrow. It's still around! Why? Who knows. But it's here long past the time that it's been the butt of jokes.

cbanek 10y ago

I guess now my Windows Phone SWAG flashlight that I got when working there is now a collectors edition. I remember when we all saw the iPhone. A lot of us knew we were in trouble when the execs kept going on about how only "enterprise customers" need a smartphone, and how it's about selling Microsoft Exchange...

peter303 10y ago

Nadella has been cleaning up Ballmer's poop. That will make Microsoft stronger some day.

deleted 10y ago

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hoi 10y ago

Actually, Nokia Software was awesome. It was their usability and UX that was dog awful. A lot of SW features that are around today have been around for a decade with Nokia. They had a plan, to move over to Meego, which won awards.. but was torpedoed by Elop. Elop destroyed Nokia, they had the best distribution network and supply chains. Linking up with Elop instantly killed that and destroyed any goodwill they had with operators and carriers who would have continued to back Nokia. Unfortunately carriers are anti-Microsoft...

wvenable 10y ago
> Nokia Software was awesome Symbian, their bread and butter, was awful from beginning to end. The burning platform memo from Elop was entirely right. Microsoft could have been a strong 3 player but they kept rebooting their platform ever 6 months.
- robin_reala 10y ago
  Not from beginning, as the beginnings of Symbian was EPOC which was great.
  - scottdupoy 10y ago
    Electronic piece of cheese! Symbian OS was very capable, full of features, but hard for developers to pick up and work with. I remember when the iPhone first came out and Symbian developers couldn't believe how few features it had ("it doesn't even multi-task!") but it did absolutely nail the user interface which is what most people noticed. As a friend working at Symbian once said to me, "it was like watching a train crash in slow motion"
  - wvenable 10y ago
    EPOC was designed for far less capable hardware than even pre-iPhone smartphones. It allowed for a lot of capability on those early Psion devices. But in modern hardware it was too fiddly and too alien (non-standard C++). Microsoft always understood the consequences of Moore's law. Palm killed them early on because Windows Mobile was just too much OS for those early devices. But as hardware improved, Palm was left with a less capable OS and Microsoft was ready. What they weren't ready for was Apple porting their desktop OS to mobile.

jrnichols 10y ago

I'm a long time Linux and Mac user, but over the past few years I've viewed Microsoft as more of an ally... and a company that has so much potential to do new and awesome things, but they just don't seem to know where to go. They seem to be missing an opportunity to make a pretty great ecosystem with the Xbox, Skype, Windows Phone, and Windows 10. I've played with the Windows Phone at a new retail store and really liked it. I'm almost wondering if they had gone for the retail stores earlier on if the tide might have gone their way just a little bit more.