Why Windows Phone will succeed?
Posted by Jussi Autere: A year ago I wrote on this blog (http://www.gearshiftgroup.com/why-windows-phone-will-fail/) about the reasons why Windows Phone will have problems in gaining popularity. As parts of the initial difficulties have been won, it is time to tell why Windows Phone has possibilities to win.
There are currently two visible trends in the use of ICT. The one that is approaching its highpoint is so popular that is has been given own acronym, BYOD (Bring Your Own Device). The second that is still emerging has multiple names depending on the background of the person speaking about it. It is the need to provide consistent user experience on a service independently on the device that the user has.
The consistent user experience covers both inside the corporate services like shared calendars or CRM systems, but more importantly also the services that a company provides to its customers. For instance, a company selling books wants its appearance to be the same across the platforms, and book buyers to be able to change a device while they are in the process of selecting a book.
BYOD has been driven by cool Macs, iPhones, and iPads. Highly paid executives and professionals have used them for working, even though they had been given corporate standard tools. The corporate IT departments have decided that it is better, from security and minimizing wasted working time standpoints, to support the BYOD devices instead of suffering the problems caused by smuggled-in devices.
But the very reasons that have made Apple the winner in the BYOD trend are going to be sources of problems for it in the consistent user experience trend. Even though the user interfaces in Apple devices resemble each other, and the user can share data across the devices all by him/herself with the help of iCloud, from a service provider view each of the Apple devices is a separate empire. The user has to download a service provider’s app separately to each device and the service provider has to cope with different rules of providing apps on different platforms. If the service provider chooses to use a Web browser instead, Apple environments do not offer any specific advantages for him.
Microsoft has approached the challenge differently. It aims to provide a consistent user interface across the platforms for basic services. Corporates can then build their own user experience by using HTML5, which works also on Apple and Android phones.
During recent years, while Apple has been conquering the end-user mindshare, Microsoft has quietly won an increasing position in the plumbing department. For instance, telecommunications operators have taken Microsoft technologies like LYNC as part of their offering. Thus, when the corporate IT guys want to improve the security and management over the BYOD devices that the users have selected, they tend to lean on Microsoft approaches.
Even though right now Microsoft appears to be a good guy using standards based solutions like HTML5, the history has shown that they know how to build a hidden agenda to gain long term competitive advantage. We will start to see it only in a couple of years.
To put money where my mouth is, I have purchased Nokia shares this fall.
Jussi, I agree with your opinions but not necessarily with the outcome. The closed ecosystem Apple is betting has gained, and is gaining, a lead difficult to catch for windows (Microsoft and Nokia), especially when it comes to tablet devices. Especially iPad is gaining so huge momentum that corporates (even Eduskunta!) are changing their systems to support Apple’s tools. BYOD trend is breaking the edge Windows has had in corporate world and the questions is whether LYNC and other “under hood” technologies are big enough factors to give a push for Microsoft’s “open” tools. And whether it will help Nokia or not.
Every time I can’t a watch a news video or change my power point presentation with my iPad I wish a good windows tablet would be available. Put every day I am also closer to switch my entire device base towards i-world or Android. Will the holistic user experience be available early enough before Apple takes over big time with now even more affordable iPhone portfolio?
A year ago, I was pessimistic, that Lumia is the hit of xmas 2011. I’m far more pessimistic this year. Actually, I’m having doubts, that there will ever be 3rd mobile ecosystem. There are strong signs, that both Microsoft and Nokia will miss this season. And that could be fatal.
Trip Chowdhry of Global Equities Research predicts, that by the end of 2012, Apple (iOS) and Google (Android) will have 98% of the worldwide mobile market, leaving just 2% for the rest, Microsoft/Nokia and RIM included. See Trip’s prediction here.
Let’s “what if” for a second.
What if Microsoft fails to create a strong enough alternative for iOS and Android in the mobiles?
WP8 is a question mark and with Surface tablet Microsoft is going to compete with its OEM partners, which are not too happy about it. For now, there seems to lack a business model for them. The WP appstore is far behind the volume of applications for Apple and Android. There is not much evidence, that Microsoft can turn the tide. They could run out of time.
What if the era of PC (as we know it) is coming to its end?
The growth of ICT device market is totally driven by tablets and phones. The figures for shipped PC units per manufacturer have remained pretty much the same for years. According to Asymco by Q1/12 the tablets had already taken a whopping 25% share of total personal computing market (phones excluded). And this had happened just in 18 months. See Asymco’s data here.
If the pace speeds up, which looks probable, since competitive Android tablets are just starting to hit the shelves – very aggressive priced – PCs could be extinct sooner than we thought. WP8 might not be enough to revitalize the sales and fight back the market shares from iOS and Android tablets.
And as storage is moving fast up to the cloud, where do we need the “traditional” PCs for?
What if users abandon “MS Office Way of Working”?
Almost all my professional career I have used Microsoft’s products. Experimented with Windows 1.0, suffered with 2.0 and get some real work done with 3.0 early 90’s. Since
then MS Office tools have been the most used productivity applications for me.
But times are changing. PowerPoint feels *really* micro-managed and old-fashioned, when compared to Haiku Deck. And do I really need all those new features of Word? Could someone provide me a spreadsheet, that is less error-prone than Excel?
Microsoft so far has not solved the real productivity issues for me, and I’m starting to have new and exciting options, some of them from the Cloud.
Microsoft is a huge company with vast resources and ability to do drastic moves, if required. Indeed, drastic moves might be required, if they plan to come out as a winner. In this race, just reaching the podium might be hard enough.