Stephen Elop’s e-mail to Microsoft employees in the devices and services division and an internal e-mail from Jo Harlow, acquired by BGR, have officially made clear the future of Nokia’s feature phones and the recently launched X range of Android devices. Microsoft will no longer make the Android-based Nokia X devices, but “select designs” from that range will be running Windows Phone in the future. This is understandable, as the company had never been approving of this effort from the Elop-era Nokia, but the axing of the feature phone business, which Jo Harlow details as it being under “maintenance mode” is a tacit admission of the smartphone business completely taking over, and a failure of conversion that Nokia had wanted.
In hind sight, Nokia was never really a fit for Microsoft, as the company visions hadn’t aligned, at all. But in the wake of a change in leadership at both the companies, one had hoped that the new strategy from Microsoft would be accommodating of the new decisions, but Satya Nadella has made it apparent that it’s not the case. However, on the future of Microsoft’s phone business, Elop notes –
With our focus, we plan to consolidate the former Smart Devices and Mobile Phones business units into one phone business unit that is responsible for all of our phone efforts. Under the plan, the phone business unit will be led by Jo Harlow with key members from both the Smart Devices and Mobile Phones teams in the management team. This team will be responsible for the success of our Lumia products, the transition of select future Nokia X products to Lumia and for the ongoing operation of the first phone business.
Couple that with Jo Harlow’s words –
Placing Mobile Phone services in maintenance mode: With the clear focus on Windows Phones, all Mobile Phones-related services and enablers are planned to move into maintenance mode, effective immediately. This means there will be no new features or updates to services on any Mobile Phones platform as a result of these plans.
and we have an answer. Microsoft officially quits the mobile phone business, which still generates quite an amount of revenue for the “Nokia” part of the company. But the overall market has been going through a long transition to smartphones, which Microsoft wants to focus on, with only a few flagship devices in different form factors. So, we guess that’s it for the super cheap Nokias that the company was once so famously known for. On the Nokia X business, Satya Nadella sought to clear the confusion in his own mail –
In addition, we plan to shift select Nokia X product designs to become Lumia products running Windows.
There goes Nokia X and the short-lived “Microsoft making Android devices” kerfuffle. “select designs” could mean just a single device utilized for running Windows Phone, as them making Android devices clearly doesn’t feature is Microsoft’s new vision of showcasing “productivity” on their platforms. Even when announcing new partners for Windows Phone, Microsoft had clearly expressed discontent over Nokia’s Android devices, so the decision is not that surprising.
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