My top tip for Microsoft: Stop charging for Windows Phone 8
Really guys, you're trying to SELL a mobile OS? C'mon
Posted in Management, 28th January 2013 13:01 GMT
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Open ... and Shut While Microsoft posted solid numbers for Windows 8, anyone paying attention to Intel's quarterly report can see that the writing is on the wall for desktop computing. Perhaps surprisingly, this is also true of the enterprise, generally not an early mover on technology trends. According to a new Appcelerator survey of enterprise IT executives, 2013 marks the first year that enterprises will build more mobile applications than desktop applications.
More surprisingly still, Microsoft appears to be the go-to mobile vendor for the enterprise.
A full 87 per cent of those surveyed indicate that more mobile apps than desktop apps will be built within the enterprise in 2013. Microsoft, the company (and not just Windows), is viewed by 28.3 per cent to be showing mobile leadership, with each of the other big enterprise vendors trailing in its wake:
No, these vendors aren't normally considered mobile's go-to vendors, but for the enterprise they definitely are.
All of which indicates Microsoft might have a chance.
After all, sales of Windows smartphones are up 400 per cent over last year, as The Register reports, but that's on a minuscule base. While Microsoft's strategy of badgering its desktop OEM partners to ship Windows 8 hasn't worked, a more plaintive tone just might. Samsung and Apple lead the pack in smartphone shipments, with roughly half the market between them, according to IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, and neither has any incentive to embrace Windows.
But this still leaves half the market that desperately needs an answer to these two mobile juggernauts:
Source: IDC Worldwide Mobile Phone Tracker, 24 Jan, 2013
Windows can be that answer, particularly within the enterprise, which has yet to definitively settle on a particular platform, despite early BYOD (bring your own device) adoption of Apple gear and more recent momentum for Samsung's Android phones. Microsoft already has Nokia's support, which shows up in the "Others" category with 4.4 million shipments of its Lumia smartphones in the fourth quarter, but it needs more.
After all, despite Appcelerator's survey indicating a clear preference for Microsoft among the mega-vendors, it also demonstrates continued affinity for iOS (80 per cent of enterprises "very interested" in developing for the iPhone and 79 per cent for the iPad) and Android (64 per cent for Android phones, 52 per cent for Android tablets), with a mere 29 per cent very interested in developing for Windows phones and 30 per cent for Windows tablets.
I've argued that Microsoft should consider Firefox OS as an option (56 per cent of enterprises "very interested" in developing for HTML5), but there's an even easier alternative to try out: subsidized Windows Phone 8.
Android didn't initially make headway against Apple because it was better. It wasn't. Far from it. No, Android won over the handset vendors and other partners because it was cheap. Cheaper than free.
For years Google has subsidized Android adoption, paying handset vendors and others to deploy the OS. Microsoft, with billions upon billions in the bank and everything to lose if it doesn't win in mobile, can afford to do the same. And then some.
Microsoft, however, has been doing the opposite.
Last year, Microsoft was reported to be licensing Windows Phone 8 to ZTE for $23 to $30 per device. For tablets it's worse: $85 per device.
It's cute and quaint that Microsoft is still trying to sell a mobile OS in a market where no one pays for a mobile OS. It's also stupid.
Despite Microsoft's understandable love affair with its old per-device licensing model, if it wants to win in mobile, it needs to take its toehold in the enterprise and subsidize its way to more mobile market share. This isn't a market where superior technology necessarily wins. Not at first, anyway. Money talks, as Android showed, and Microsoft has lots of that. It's time to put it to use. ®
Matt Asay is vice president of corporate strategy at 10gen, the MongoDB company. Previously he was SVP of business development at Nodeable, which was acquired in October 2012. He was formerly SVP of biz dev at HTML5 start-up Strobe (now part of Facebook) and chief operating officer of Ubuntu commercial operation Canonical. With more than a decade spent in open source, Asay served as Alfresco's general manager for the Americas and vice president of business development, and he helped put Novell on its open source track. Asay is an emeritus board member of the Open Source Initiative (OSI). His column, Open...and Shut, appears three times a week on The Register. You can follow him on Twitter @mjasay.
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COMMENTS
"the writing is on the wall for desktop computing."
Verily 'tis the shit of the horse.
Re: "the writing is on the wall for desktop computing."
Exactly.
The only reason we were buying computers ten years ago was that then a 5 year old computer had a AMD K-6 processor in it running at a tiny percentage of the speed of the cheapest new equipment available.
My slowest computers from like 7 years ago have AMD64 3200+ processors in them, which are still sold as a entry grade processor in maplins IIRC. These machines are perfectly adequate for running office 2003 + our one peice of software, the users don't want or need any of the functionality that has come out since and as far as I am concerned the existing computers can continue to run until something burns out, at which point the user can have another one from stores. (spares from downsizing)
If i'm spending money on anything, then it's on infrastructure not on desktops. The constant desktop upgrade treadmill is dead, and most businesses also have a supply of spare desktops so there is not going to be much spending on more desktops in the immediate future.
However, saying that the lack of sales for the reasons above means desktop computing is dead is stupidly absurd. When all of the existing equipment is dead what do you think we'll do, replace a secrateries computer with an ipad? Never going to work, you need desktops for producing things- tablets are just a means of consuming media not for creating it.
No longer a huge cash cow does not mean dead.
You're joking, right?
People keep saying this as if repeating it endlessly will make it true. Whether they realize it or not, a touch interface is the LAST thing that most people want on a desktop. Desktops and laptops require a different interface that is tuned to keyboard and mouse input because it's a different working model. It's about content creation on a desktop, not consumption.
And before you point to the built-in soft keyboards on tablets, I have yet to see anyone typing with anywhere near the speed that I know that they're capable of on a full keyboard. From what I've personally witnessed, most lose about 75-90% of their typing efficiency. That may be OK for banging out a quick tweet or Facebook post, but it's FAR from adequate for anyone trying to write anything more complex than a couple of paragraphs. I can't imagine that attempting to write even a short 3-5 page paper using a touch UI, let alone something even a few tens of pages long.
Then there's attempting to use touch and gestures to do a mouse's job. Ever try to draw with one? Or work on a complex technical diagram that requires precise positioning for selection? I thought not.
Don't get me wrong. I think a touch driven interface is great for tablets and phones. It's just that it's a lousy UI model for desktops and laptops. Eventually this fad will fade and we'll see a return to a more logical split in UIs.
Re: "the writing is on the wall for desktop computing."
The decline in desktop sales is only down to the fact that the software isn't there to take advantage of any CPU tech since 2007. I'm not including games in this though that sector is still lagging.
Take any old dual core enterprise PC off the IT Stores shelf and slap a new build on it and its good to go
Folks still want and need desktops just not in the sheer numbers we needed 10 years ago. We can just sweat the assets far longer.
As for needing more CPU power, other than video transcoding software, anything in the basic business software remit that would make a CPU spin up to 100% for more than 5 seconds would be viewed with suspicion.
"Android didn't initially make headway against Apple because it was better. It wasn't. Far from it. No, Android won over the handset vendors and other partners because it was cheap. Cheaper than free."
Well hang on, we're confusing two things. If it's about what manufacturers chose, then they obviously didn't choose IOS, because they couldn't - it's not available for licensing. It helped that Android was free, as it meant it was a better choice than say continuing to write their own OSs, but it still helped that it was good.
For users, actually yes, we bought it because it was better. ("Far from it"? Sure early Android versions lacked some features, but early IOS couldn't even do apps or copy/paste, let alone something like multitasking - it struggled to qualify as a feature phone OS. Satnav only came recently. Still waiting for a homescreen that even my 2005 feature phone had.)
The new Office Garage series:
