Microsoft, Nokia and the Snowgun

Interesting take Bob. I've read some positive things about winphone recently. I have a few friends using them and they seem very happy. One is even a former iphone user.
I've been considering trying one myself. I've lived in both the IOS and Android ecosystems for a while. After reading your views I will need to investigate further.
Thanks as always for your posts and newsletter!
Tony

I have a Nokia Lumia 521 Windows 8 phone, it is near perfect AND it only cost me $150 to own outright! I am very happy with this T-Mobile phone. I hope MS continues with what Nokia started in providing quality phones at reasonable prices.
Larry

Hi while I am aware that you are looking from an American perspective where nokia were never that big. I have to say that I have had lots of mobiles over the years. The first few were Ericsson which lasted for years and never gave any trouble they were only replaced when the battery life dropped to a few days. They joined up with Sony and I had about 4 of their phones which went from bad to worse. The last Sony was repaired 3 times and replaced twice in one year. I then joined most folk in Europe and got a nokia, an e 71 once you got used to its operating system it was a fantastic phone 9 or 10 days battery life and often bounced off concrete from 6 or 10 foot height. Had GPS and proper maps on the phone none of this download maps as you drive and If you lose signal your lost too sh*t that Apple and android do. Current phone is an nokia n700 much better GPS even smaller but still has 2 or 3 days battery life and also has been dropped on concrete a few times with out problems. While as a phone very good call quality not like iphone which chops the end off most words. The other thing about iphone I see most folk charging them 2 or3 times a day while both iphone and Samsung phones all seem to have cracked screens. Now my better half has a nokia lumia 800 and I am very impressed with both the camera and how smooth win phone 7.5 works and battery on that lasts about 3 days so probably my next phone will be lumia 925 or whatever is out then current phone is only 2 years old so it might be another 2 years but it will be a nokia. To sum up nokia make phones not style icons and while I have about 50 apps on my phone I only use maps notes camera and e reader so the fact that iphone has half a billion apps don't interest me, I will gladly swop it for a battery life of few days

In the era of Win 95 I bought a windows phone. I liked it. When Win 98 came along Microsoft stop supporting the old phone. I thought it was a mistake but then I would. Maybe Microsoft is filled with the next newest thing people. Their OS's are only supported for a limited time before they fix what's not broken so why not their hardware? I am an old white man and alas Microsoft is run by old white men or if not chronologically old, intellectually old. As Nokia goes I like Nokia I have exclusively used their products for years until Android. Microsoft not so much. The reason I think this is in my estimation Microsoft is living in the past. They are allowing a conservative bunch to ruin a formerly progressive company. They need to lead not leave the starting gate ten minutes late.

Bob, this is BY FAR, THE BEST ANA;YSIS OF THIS TOPIC I HAVE SEEN! Keep up the good work.

Well, admittedly I am very late to the smart phone party, but I just bought the Nokia Lumia 520 last weekend - two days before the announcement that Microsoft had bought Nokia. This is my first smartphone and I LOVE it!! I am already running Windows on my PC, so having the same OS on my phone made a lot of sense to me, and made everything a whole lot easier to learn. The Lumia 520 was on sale over the Labour Day weekend as pre-paid phone for only $99, so I have no outrageously expensive monthly contract either! You cannot beat that price for a no-contract smart phone up here in Canada. The GPS functionality on it is better than my dedicated Garmin GPS, gmail was incredibly easy to set up and all my contacts migrated over perfectly. Honestly, this phone has everything I could want in a smart phone, and I couldn't be more thrilled with it. So I am hoping that the Microsoft/Nokia merger will work out well for Nokia because, based on my experience so far with the Lumia I would definitely buy another when the time comes.

I dunno! I found your assessment quite harsh or at least negative.
I have been in the Microsoft camp since Win3.1 and I despise the business model of Apple that (at the very least) is very monopolistic and truly inflexible for advanced users (who don't know Unix).
Wasn't it Apple that whined and sued MSFT for interleaving InternetExplorer as a part of their Operating System? Yet the common iPhone user needs to be breast-fed from iTunes and must practically own multiple other expensive Apple product$ for a simple turnkey operation.
The other competition for users’ dollars is Google/Android and Google paid dearly to buy Motorola for IP fights against Apple.
Don't get me wrong, I think Google/Moto-X appears to be a capable OpenSouce smartphone and wish them success in the marketplace.
I may be the odd man out but I feel Windows8 is a very stable Operating System and has built-in flexibility for multiple types of computing environments (smartphones/tablets/desktops). I wish them the best of luck in their attempts and hope they put up a stiff fight in a 3-way competitive marketplace that the consumers will gain great benefit from. I would not hesitate to own a WinSurfacePro and/or a Windows Phone, if need need arises.

Excellent analysis, Bob.
Only... when I got to your opening words in that sentence "But when a software giant that cannot make a marketable mobile OS..." I jumped because I missed the "mobile" at first sight, and was assuming you were talking about Windows 8, which I truly believe to be a loser. An OS which purports to represent the 32-year-old software tradition of the venerable Personal Computer, but which indeed despises the PC. It seems like it's time to call Bill Gates to come back at the helm!

Mr. Rankin . . . my Sentiments, EXACTLY!!!

TheRube

I have to agree on the point that this deal may not help Microsoft, but dogging the Windows phone and Surface is totally unfair. I've been using the Windows phone since they came out and I'll agree the HTC phone didn't do it justice, but I know have the Samsung SGH-i667 and it will out perform any iPhone or Android on the market. It's faster, takes much better pictures and has Office which as a Systems Repair tech comes in very handy. The Surface out performs the iPad by a mile especially having the added USB and SD Reader. I think if Microsoft would hire better Ad designers they could jump up quickly, but as it stands now their Ad Men Suck.

I, for one, hope this merger is successful. I moved from the I-Phone which to me has become boring to the Nokia 920 and love the OS and the phone. Only drawback I see is waiting for addl apps, but that's not critical to me. I also don't find Android that cool -- tired of the same boring Icons that just "sit" there. Give me Windows 8 any day --- I know, I'm a voice in the desert, but I'm having fun in this brave new world of Windows 8.

Not sure if this analysis is just to make people react or you mean every word... However it seems that a lot of the underlying reasons for this acquisition are being missed.

I am not the best proponent of Microsoft but anyone who thinks they (MS) have "grand visions of becoming more like Apple" are missing the whole competitive ilk here.

Anyone remember the death knells of Apple? (Twice!)

MS are already in key number one slots in many places and I don't think just becoming "a mobile phone producer" is very high up on their Business Criteria list. They DO want to become more "mobile" yes and they have already sunk a lot of money into Nokia yes, but does anyone think $7 billion is much to MS? (Remember Hotmail? MS paid $600 million for that when they could have developed the program for much less than 1/2 million at the time. That was all about emails addresses, know how, contacts, planning etc.)

This is all about the long haul and bringing "pieces" into a much bigger Business Plan. Yes, MS's core is operating systems but all companies need to expand and grow their BUSINESS lines not just their revenue.

Nokia were already trashing their OWN future (old handsets, little innovation, etc.) MS didn't cause that, Nokia did themselves (I still have a Nokia Communicator (in my drawer of course!) and it WAS THE BEST BUSINESS mobile phone/all-in-one's on the market with fax, extensive phone book/contacts, business features (forwarding messages was a dream!) but it never moved on!!).

It will be a challenge to bring in so many employees, yes and to decide where to fit this into their organisation but are you guys REALLY going to bet AGAINST Microsoft??

Watch this space I guess...