Microsoft still can't connect

Microsoft could have only thought one thing when news reached them that Martin Cooper – the acknowledged inventor of the mobile phone during his time at Motorola – was having trouble setting up Microsoft Exchange on his brand new Windows Phone 7. Whoops.

Cooper's not alone. Try trawling the mobile forums and you'll find a range of similar complaints. Users are routinely finding difficulty getting their Outlook contacts onto their new phones.

The cottoned-on users discovered that you need a Windows Live Hotmail account that is compatible with Exchange ActiveSync and you must install the Outlook Hotmail Connector, only to then find there seems to be no way to sync Tasks or Notes, or even any native apps in Windows Phone 7 for Tasks or Notes.

Why all this trouble? Microsoft offers a partial explanation by stating on an Exchange ActiveSync support page for Win Phone 7 that, “It's important to note that Windows Phone 7 (WP7) primarily was developed as a consumer device and not an enterprise device.”

That goes some way towards explaining the very limited implementation of Office apps. While you can access documents by connecting to SharePoint servers, thanks to the cut-down functionality of the Windows Phone 7 you can do so little with the documents that there's hardly any point.

What remains inexplicable is why Microsoft has failed to properly capitalise on the huge reservoir of loyal business users who are crying out for a workable mobile Windows operating system – cries that are steadily being met by the company's rivals. On the face of it, that certainly seems to be what's happening.

Apple's iPhone has rapidly morphed from a consumer-only device to something much more business-friendly, and is leading the “bring your own device” phenomenon.

Furthermore, Android is slowly acquiring business smarts as it takes over the world in the consumer space and even the embattled Research in Motion (RIM) is finally broadening the Blackberry's appeal from being a messaging-only platform.

Microsoft counters that updates will add functionality over time, but Windows Phone 7 may not have the luxury of time.

Firstly, as pointed out by Gartner research vice president of enterprise communications applications Geoff Johnson, it has never actually been established that Microsoft has any advantage in the business smartphone market despite its huge mindshare and brand name equity that gives it an advantage in other markets.

Secondly, Johnson said that with so many global brand names lining up behind the Android platform to release tablet and smartphone devices, there is increasing expectation in the market of openness or the ability to connect a multitude of different devices. Thus if Microsoft did come up with meaningful developments in this space there would be demand for them to interconnect with other platforms in an open way, something that was not true of the current Microsoft environment.

Gartner's most recent forecast for the smartphone space has Android taking over as the dominant OS by the end of this year and cementing its position with nearly 50 per cent of the market by 2012. Microsoft, on the other hand, will make up just 5.6 per cent of the market this year and 10.8 per cent in 2012.

Asked whether the mobile telcos had a role to play in popularising the Win Phone 7 platform, Johnson suggested that at this point in the game the domination of Android devices and Apple's iPhone meant that the telcos were simply rounding out their portfolios with Windows devices but were certainly not relying on product releases from the Nokia/Microsoft stable.

The bright spot for Windows Phone 7 in its late bid to be relevant in the new smartphone environment was the February announcement of the tie up with Nokia.

Nokia CEO and former Microsoft employee Stephen Elop announced that Nokia's own Symbian OS would be retired and future smartphones would be built from the ground up to run Windows Phone 7. A tight integration between hardware and software? It just might work.

Then again, while acknowledging the tie up was probably a good idea, Johnson made the point that putting together two businesses that are under pressure doesn't necessarily improve the prospects of either.

Perhaps most tellingly, Gartner's summary of the developing smartphone market by Research Vice President Carolina Milanesi had this to say.

 “Consumers who already own an open OS communications device will be drawn to media tablets and more often than not, to media tablets that share the same OS as their smartphone. This allows consumers to be able to share the same experience across devices as well as apps, settings or game scores. At the same time, tablet users who don't own a smartphone could be prompted to adopt one to be able to share the experience they have on their tablets.”

And what did we see last week? A preview of Windows 8 for tablets, laptops and desktops with a new touch UI eerily reminiscent of Windows Phone 7.

As Johnson said, “Microsoft has a habit of throwing resources at a problem to make a problem go away. Talent, money, whatever is needed. Like water dripping on a stone. It might take a few years but you never write Microsoft off.”

Ted Gibbons is the recent former editor of New Zealand PC World magazine and prior to that was the editor of consumer electronics title Tone magazine.