Microsoft misses out on opportunity : only 2 Microsoft mobility products among nominees for GSM Association Awards 2006
January 23, 2006 [General]
Motorola Q is being delayed and Microsoft has not yet released push e-mail... so no wonder, that there are very few Microsoft mobility products nominated for GSM Association Awards 2006 - a competition that takes place during 3GSM World Congress next month in Spain.
3GSM World Congress is the biggest and most important event in mobile phone industry - that takes place each year in February - and it sets a tone for the whole year... This is a conference/exhibition mostly for employees (managers) from mobile operators from all over the world, and for professionals (not consumers) from mobile phone industry, so truly Microsoft is missing out on big opportunity...
Let's take a look where Microsoft could score, if only delays could be prevented (too late) or where Microsoft yet can score (2 products managed to get nomination):
Actually the only category, in which Microsoft itself is nominated is "Best Service Delivery Platform" where Microsoft's "Microsoft Connected Services Framework" - an offering for mobile operators - is starting.
The push e-mail upgrade for Windows Mobile 5.0 still is very badly delayed - Microsoft squandered the opportunity by not releasing this upgrade together with Windows Mobile 5.0 launch, and still it is not available yet although Microsoft employees assure that it is out and manufacturers have it already and are testing it. If Microsoft would release push e-mail early enough, it would have chances to get nominated in category "Best Mobile Messaging Service" where both BlackBerry and Visto are starting...
In category "Best 3G Handset or Device" no Windows Mobile phone has been nominated - it is well known that lack of UMTS handsets is the main weakness of Windows Mobile phones and the only 3G phone powered by Windows Mobile is too big to be considered a mobile phone (HTC Universal is rather a mini-notebook, not a mobile phone).
Fortunately in the category "Best GSM Handset or Device" Samsung Electronics Co Ltd managed to get nomination for the Samsung SGH-i300 smartphone. The Nokia N91 (another smartphone with hard disk) is being significantly delayed due to failure of Nokia's engineers, so here a big window of opportunity opens for Windows Mobile! Please note that Samsung SGH-i300 must compete here with regular, non-smartphone phones, so this is open competition, not just smartphone-limited. |
