primary-platform.ars
Capitulation: Nokia adopts Windows Phone 7
By
Ryan Paul
| Last updated
February 11, 2011 9:35 AM
In a joint briefing made at Nokia's Capital Markets Day event, Microsoft
and
Nokia
announced a partnership to collaborate on mobile technology. Nokia has
adopted Windows
Phone 7 as its primary mobile phone platform and it will also embrace
Microsoft's
Web services stack, including the Bing search engine.
The partnership creates some uncertainty about Nokia's existing platform
efforts,
including the Linux-based MeeGo operating system that Nokia co-develops
in
collaboration
with Intel and other vendors. Nokia has confirmed that it will continue
selling its
current lineup of Symbian devices and that it has at least one MeeGo
device
planned
for launch this year.
Symbian will soon be phased out entirely, however, and MeeGo will be
relegated to
an open source experiment with significantly reduced development
resources.
Nokia's
excellent Qt development toolkit, which was once the unifying
centerpiece
of
the
company's platform strategy, will not be coming to Windows Phone 7. Qt
will
continue
to be supported in a limited capacity as the primary development toolkit
for
Symbian
and as part of the MeeGo stack.
Nokia and Microsoft contend that their union will bring together the
strengths of
Nokia's hardware expertise and Microsoft's software and service
ecosystem.
It's not,
however, entirely clear if this is going to be beneficial for both
parties.
This
deal gets Nokia a modern platform that is roughly competitive and ready
to
ship on
devices today, but the biggest downside is that it guts the company's
software autonomy.
Adoption of Windows Phone 7 is fundamentally an act of capitulation by
Nokia-an acknowledgement
that the company is incapable of building its own ecosystem or
innovating
above the
hardware layer.
The transition will be difficult and costly. Nokia has virtually no
internal
development
expertise on Microsoft's platform and will have to start from scratch as
it
works
to adopt the operating system. Though promising, Windows Phone 7 is
still
nascent
and doesn't have strong consumer or developer mindshare yet.
Nokia has thrown its existing developer community under the bus and will
likely not
be able to keep them interested in participating in the brave new world
of
Windows
Phone 7 devices. We are already seeing Nokia third-party developers
talking
about
moving to Android in response to today's announcement. On the other
hand,
Nokia's
commitment to bringing Windows Phone 7 to the world might motivate some
of
the C#
developers who are coding on Windows (a very large potential audience)
to
start looking
seriously at getting into mobile.
Diminished ambitions
Nokia CEO Stephen Elop says that 2011 and 2012 will be "transitional"
years
for the
company. He declined to announce when Nokia will ship its first Windows
Phone 7 device,
but he intends to pull the company forward towards that milestone at a
rapid
pace.
From Microsoft's side of the table, the deal looks a lot more
beneficial.
Adoption
by the largest hardware vendor could help validate Windows Phone 7 and
make
it a
stronger contender. On the other hand, it could scare away Microsoft's
other
partners.
Microsoft is giving Nokia more control over the platform's future and
possibly providing
other exclusive privileges. This could make the operating system look
less
appealing
to HTC and others, driving them to build tighter relationships with
Google.
Microsoft
danced around this issue during the press briefing.
It's not clear if Microsoft's brand is strong enough in Europe or if
Nokia's
brand
is strong enough in the United States to make their combined product
particularly
desirable in either market. Addressing that question, Elop emphasized
that
he has
already discussed the partnership with European carriers and has found
them
to be
receptive and enthusiastic about the partnership.
Whether this deal can save Nokia is a question that's difficult to
answer,
but it's
clear that the company's ambitions have diminished. Adopting Microsoft's
platform
puts Nokia in the unenviable position of being dependent on Microsoft
and
the success
of Microsoft's fledgling mobile platform.
In light of the challenges that both companies have faced in recent
years
in
their
respective efforts to deliver a credible mobile solution, both will face
an
uphill
battle as they struggle to compete with Apple and Google. It's a gamble
for
both
Microsoft and Nokia, but if they can get the formula right, they could
jointly form
a formidable mobile juggernaut.
Edward
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