Nokia: Microsoft Must Evolve To Make Windows Phone a Success

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Nokia: Microsoft Must Evolve To Make Windows Phone a Success

Posted by Unknown on Friday July 26, 2013 @05:20AM from the about-firing-the-maemo-staff dept.

DavidGilbert99 writes "Microsoft's priorities are Windows, Office, Xbox, and Surface. Windows Phone is no where near the top and that is the main reason why it has failed to make the impact many hoped for in the three years it has been around. While Microsoft can take the hit and play the long-game, the same cannot be said for Nokia, the other main player in the eco-system. While it has done all it can to evolve the platform, it needs Microsoft to step up and begin innovating. Bryan Biniak, Nokia VP, agrees: 'We are trying to evolve the cultural thinking [at Microsoft] to say 'time is of the essence.' Waiting until the end of your fiscal year when you need to close your targets, doesn't do us any good when I have phones to sell today.'"

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Good luck .. by gstoddart · 2013-07-26 05:25 · Score: 5, Insightful

While it has done all it can to evolve the platform, it needs Microsoft to step up and begin innovating
If your company future depends on Microsoft innovating on your behalf ... you're already screwed.
I'm hard pressed to think of anything really innovative Microsoft has done in years -- mostly they look at what others are doing and copy it (or buy it).
If they're going to put out the Windows Phone platform and then wait around until people buy it to take it seriously, nobody is ever going to take it seriously.

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1. Re:Good luck .. by Anonymous Coward · 2013-07-26 05:41 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  I'm hard pressed to think of anything really innovative Microsoft has done in years -- mostly they look at what others are doing and copy it (or buy it).
  That made Apple the #1 company on the planet, don't knock it!
2. Re:Good luck .. by nine-times · 2013-07-26 05:48 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  mostly they look at what others are doing and copy it (or buy it).
  That's not the problem. The Metro UI is fairly innovative, for example, and not really copying or buying something. The problem is, it's bad.
  The problem is that Microsoft has put too much focus into pushing their internal business agenda, and not enough on servicing their customers. Microsoft's development model is about deciding which strategic product they'd like you to buy, and then trying to force you to use it by hook or by crook, except they rarely consider the option of getting you to buy it by making it a great product.
3. Re:Good luck .. by molnarcs · 2013-07-26 05:58 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  It was a stupid decision to tie themselves to Microsoft. The new Lumia and its camera is a very attractive phone for me. Probably most photographers would look at a phone's camera first, even though we are used to hauling around heavy gear. I would buy this phone in a second if it was running Android. And I'm sure I'm not alone - smartphone cameras are killing the compact camera market, and this is a feature that is important to many people. I also love some of their design choices.
  
  Nokia still has some brand recognition left, especially in South-East Asia, but it's vanishing alarmingly fast. Had they introduced the Lumia 808 a year ago with stock Android and we some clever marketing campaign, they would have created some buzz. They could increase that buzz with this new launch. Instead, their are complaining about Microsoft. Big fracking LOL at them and their choice for a CEO.
4. Re:Good luck .. by David+Gerard · 2013-07-26 05:59 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  I know a pile of people with Windows phones. They really like them lots and find the interface marvellous.
  Every one of them says the big problem is ... no bloody apps.
  
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  http://rocknerd.co.uk
5. Re:Good luck .. by WCMI92 · 2013-07-26 06:04 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Microsoft's "innovation" has been played out for over a decade. The last several years most of their products has been WORSE and a step back from the previous ones!
  Look at Windows 8 and the last couple versions of Office, for example. Their UI's are terrible designs. I will absolutely NEVER deploy a Windows 8 PC for an end user because I don't want the headache of supporting it.
  Microsoft pretty much had the UI down when they released Windows 2000 and Office 97. Everything they've DONE to their UI since has been a step backward. Why do they do it? Because to justify the upgrades they have to MAKE IT LOOK DIFFERENT. Which means screwing with UI functionality. Why is that all they can do to differentiate product? Because they have NO IDEAS for actual features or enhancements to make the product any better!
  The only product Microsoft has put out in 10 years that was better than it's predecessor was Windows 7. And that only because Vista was so awful that they panicked and actually LISTENED to their customers for once. Which they promptly undid when they decided to force keyboard and mouse based PC users to navigate a tablet touch screen by DEFAULT in Windows 8. My Macbook Pro doesn't force me to see an IOS UI by default...
  
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  Corporatism != Free Market
6. Re:Good luck .. by Andrio · 2013-07-26 07:38 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  "Innovation" is a meaningless buzz word that rarely ever applies.
  "Execution" is the important thing. It's the single biggest reason for Apple's huge success the last decade. Harddrive-based MP3 players, touch screen smartphones, tablets... Apple didn't create any of these. They just executed them well, and marketed the crap out of them.
  
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7. Re:Good luck .. by WCMI92 · 2013-07-26 07:45 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Have you spent much time with Windows 7? I would say it's UI is in every way better than Windows 2000.
  
  I disagree. Windows 7 was where I started using Classic Shell (which will also make Windows 8 bearable). The last OS UI that, IMHO, could be argued as an improvement over it's predecessor was Windows XP, and the differences between it and Windows 2000's UI were very minor and mostly thematic.
  Windows 7 attempted to be a poor copy of the Mac OS UI (encouraging you to dock all your programs to the taskbar) and Windows 8 attempted to be a piss poor copy of an Android/iPad/iPhone touchscreen UI on a mouse and keyboard PC desktop...
  
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  Corporatism != Free Market
8. Re:Good luck .. by whoever57 · 2013-07-26 08:29 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Except that Nokia could have dominated Android.
  At the time of the Burning Platforms memo, Samsung had not established its dominance over Android, Nokia had one of the best brand names, it had the largest market share of smartphones (yes, more than Apple at that time).
  Had Elop not Osbourned the Symbian phones, he would have had time to transition to Android and could have leveraged its market share to advantage instead of adopting a platform with a history of failure.
  Yes,Elop got some cash from Microsoft, but that money has run out now. Nokia will be paying Microsoft in the coming quarters. Nokia would not have needed the cash if it had not Osbourned Symbian.
  
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  The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Don't worry Nokia by marcello_dl · 2013-07-26 05:25 · Score: 5, Insightful

Well if Nokia financial situation becomes unbearable, I am sure microsoft can step up and buy her up, obviously at a discounted price. Which likely was the objective all along.

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Who peed their pants to stay warm? by h4rr4r · 2013-07-26 05:26 · Score: 5, Insightful

Nokia cuts its own throat and now has no one else to blame. Elop will quietly move back the MS once they are done.
Exactly zero people will be surprised.
So what you're saying is... by oh_my_080980980 · 2013-07-26 05:29 · Score: 5, Insightful

...you made a mistake by ditching symbian and focusing on Windows...hmmm.....
Smart Companies by Nyder · 2013-07-26 05:33 · Score: 3, Insightful

Don't let MS buy them.

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Summary: Microsoft is holding us back by randallman · 2013-07-26 05:46 · Score: 5, Insightful

So the gist of this article is that Nokia is doing fantastic things with hardware, but Microsoft isn't keeping up and holding Nokia back. If Nokia had control of the OS, they'd be in much better shape. They would have this freedom with Android AND instant access to its software market. And Maemo/Meego was a fine OS (I owned the n800 and n900), which shipped with Android app compatibility. It's clear that Windows Phone was a horrible choice. How could they not see this coming when everyone was yelling at them telling them they were making a mistake?
True by Anonymous Coward · 2013-07-26 06:21 · Score: 5, Insightful

True, but Apple mostly improved upon the things they bought. Microsoft has a history of thinking "hmm, that's not quite right, it needs more cruft!".
Microsoft by BlindRobin · 2013-07-26 06:23 · Score: 3, Insightful

No one consciously chooses a Microsoft [product|platform|environment] on it's merits alone. If it is chosen it is largely, if not entirely, because of external factors ,the dominant of which is market dominance. Microsoft have had a terrible history of being slow on the pivot with regard to changing markets. They are in actual peril and in fear of being bypassed by more agile competitors even those with their own problems of inertia.