Long term, the odds of WP7 outselling both are better than slim because Microsoft was thinking about the low end market when they designed WP7.
There are two standard screen sizes, 800 x 480 and 400 x 480 which is well suited for cheaper commodity devices.
Nokia sold 93 million commodity devices last quarter (that's about half the number of iPhones ever sold). The market is huge and neither Android or iOS is likely to go there.
Android won't because the development costs of adapting the OS to small low margin commodity devices would be borne by the manufacturers and carriers, and iOS won't because of Apple's branding strategy.
Nokia recognized that its core competency was manufacturing and hardware design, not user interfaces and software development. Considering that they were probably better at both than any other handset manufacturer, it is probable that other handset manufacturers will follow course, should Nokia see even moderate success with their strategy.
[edit] Nokia has sold 1.5 billion S40 devices. WP7 is what will replace them.
Android is already on the low end commodity devices. And those manufacturers and carriers (i.e. prepay or non-US) don't seem that fussed about adapting Android, they just use stock. So it's only really the chip suppliers who need to get Android working.
MediaTek, who Elop cited as eating Nokia's low-end market by suppling chips to no-name brands in his "burning platform" memo also have been working on Android for a while and have partnered with Google to make GoogleTV (i.e. Android) chipsets too.
Yes, attaching a retracting security connector to a removable battery cover wasn't a particularly smart move.
I also noticed the Nokia knock-offs in the background. Though I'm not sure if any of the phones are built by the chip maker themselves as ODM samples or if they're provided by customers who've bought their chips.
There's another video here with a better look at the Nokia-alikes as well as the tablets they're powering and it's more obvious that they've gathered together products from a range of low end brands that they've sold chips to.
> There are two standard screen sizes, 800 x 480 and 400 x 480 which is well suited for cheaper commodity devices.
There are Android devices being sold with 200x320 screens. To say nothing about Nokia's huge sales of S40 devices.
> Android won't because the development costs of adapting the OS to small low margin commodity devices would be borne by the manufacturers and carriers,
The closer you are to the upstream manufacturer's (the company you buy chips from) reference design, the lower your costs. I can't imagine companies that cater to the lowest-end of the market trying to differentiate on technology.
> WP7 is what will replace them.
There are a lot of if's in this idea. It could happen IF Microsoft could make WP7 attractive on low-end devices (big if #1) AND Android manufacturers fail to make Android run on them (big if #2) AND Nokia decides they will replace S40 with WP7 (big if #3). Samsung will merge Bada into Tizen (a.k.a. Meego) and pursue the low-end segment with it. WP7 will only be a contender for the low end if Samsung starts to fail in a market they know very well (big if #4).
When you see Microsoft paying money to Nokia so that they boost WP7 market share you have to imagine they already failed to convince more viable companies to do it. I have little doubt Microsoft offered similar deals to Samsung, LG, HTC and others and Nokia was simply the cheapest one. Or the only one who took it.
>"When you see Microsoft paying money to Nokia so that they boost WP7 market share you have to imagine they already failed to convince more viable companies to do it."
Well Microsoft's strategy with the "more viable companies" appears to be receiving a check every time those companies - HTC, Samsung, LG - ship an Android phone (Now at 70% of Android phones in the US market).
Over the long term, I would not be surprised to see those companies switch to WP7 given that they are already paying Microsoft for the OS on their phones.
Look at it this way, Microsoft already has agreements with those companies, and therefore, those companies have a much better chance of influencing the future direction of WP7 than they do of Android - Google is not partnering with anyone except Motorola Mobility which they should soon own.
> Over the long term, I would not be surprised to see those companies switch to WP7 given that they are already paying Microsoft for the OS on their phones.
Except for the fact Android phones outsell WP7 ones 40 to 1
There are two standard screen sizes, 800 x 480 and 400 x 480 which is well suited for cheaper commodity devices.
Nokia sold 93 million commodity devices last quarter (that's about half the number of iPhones ever sold). The market is huge and neither Android or iOS is likely to go there.
Android won't because the development costs of adapting the OS to small low margin commodity devices would be borne by the manufacturers and carriers, and iOS won't because of Apple's branding strategy.
Nokia recognized that its core competency was manufacturing and hardware design, not user interfaces and software development. Considering that they were probably better at both than any other handset manufacturer, it is probable that other handset manufacturers will follow course, should Nokia see even moderate success with their strategy.
[edit] Nokia has sold 1.5 billion S40 devices. WP7 is what will replace them.