Microsoft's CEO, Satya Nadella, recently confessed during an interview with Business Insider that the company's exit from the mobile phone business was not handled optimally. He acknowledged that this decision, regarded as one of his most challenging as CEO, could have been approached differently. In hindsight, he believes there were opportunities to reinvent the concept of computing that bridges PCs, tablets, and phones. Nadella's admission follows a series of setbacks in Microsoft's mobile strategy, including a substantial write-off of $7.6 billion associated with the acquisition of Nokia's phone business. Notably, he joins a line of former Microsoft CEOs who've expressed regrets regarding the company's mobile endeavors.
Bill Gates, a former CEO, referred to Microsoft's failure to compete with Android as his "greatest mistake ever." Similarly, former CEO Steve Ballmer lamented not focusing on phones sooner, citing a period in the early 2000s when the company's emphasis on Windows Vista hindered the reallocation of resources to the emerging device category known as the smartphone.
This candid reflection from Satya Nadella comes against the backdrop of Microsoft's evolving relationship with the mobile industry, marked by multiple iterations of Windows Phones, substantial investments, and ultimately, the discontinuation of Windows Phone in 2017.
Timeline of Microsoft's Attempt at Smartphones aka Windows Phones
1. The first iteration of Windows Phone as we know it was announced at MWC 2010 in Barcelona.
2. Windows Phone 7 was widely regarded as a great base for an OS platform, featuring a 4 x 2 layout of solid-coloured live tiles.
3. The first Lumia device running Windows was launched in November 2011-- Lumia 800
3. In 2012, Windows Phone 8 succeeded it, replacing the Windows CE-based kernel of Windows Phone 7 with the Windows NT kernel used by the PC versions of Windows.
4. In 2014, Microsoft released the Windows Phone 8.1 update, which introduced the Cortana virtual assistant, and Windows Runtime platform support to create cross-platform apps between Windows PCs and Windows Phone.
5. In 2015, Microsoft released Windows 10 Mobile, which promoted increased integration and unification with its PC counterpart.
6. Despite these efforts, interest in Windows Phone from app developers began to diminish by mid-decade.
7. Windows Phone was officially discontinued in October 2017 when Microsoft’s corporate vice president, Joe Belfiore, confirmed that Microsoft would no longer sell or manufacture new Windows 10 Mobile devices. The existing devices received bug fixes and security updates only, ending for the latest devices in December 2019.
