Blog posts tagged with 'microsoft'

Microsoft’s upcoming Surface seems to have opened the floodgates as far as the tablet market is concerned. Google have entered the 7” tablet fray with the Nexus 7 (expected to ship later this month), and even Apple are rumoured to be working on a miniature version of the iPad (though many think this rumour baseless; Apple have always had very clear ideas on screen size). But perhaps the most surprising update is Samsung’s announcement that they’re prepping a tablet to run on Windows RT. For the uninitiated, Windows RT is a stripped-down version of Windows 8 designed to run on devices using ARM-based processors, such as tablets. The OS is sold only to developers, for the express purpose of preloading onto their devices; it is not intended as a standalone product for consumers. So why have Samsung opted to follow Microsoft’s lead, and release a new tablet to coincide with the release of Windows 8, when they’ve traditionally been associated with Android? Surely it would make more sense for the South Korean chaebol to utilize Google’s upcoming Android 4.1, Jelly Bean – or even wait for their much-anticipated Chrome OS, which is ultimately expected to homogenize the Google user experience and act as a bridge between laptops, tablets and Smartphones. There are a number of explanations. The most obvious is the notion that Samsung have already established themselves as a force to be reckoned with in the Android market: they’re exceeded only by Apple as the premier provider of Smartphones (at least in terms of profits). It would make sense to try and diversify their market with a tablet utilizing a new OS, rather than stick to the same, tired iterations of Android. More ominously, this could signal a sea-shift in Samsung’s attitudes towards Google. Many have hypothesized that Samsung are attempting to distance themselves from Google, recently - though Google make a show of support for all adopters of their Android OS, Samsung has recently made the decision to utilize the Tizen operating system on their lower-spec Smartphones, despite the surfeit of older versions of Android (such as Froyo and Gingerbread) that are perfectly suited for this task. Samsung clearly want a little more autonomy in terms of software; or perhaps they’re just uncomfortable with putting all of their eggs in Google’s basket. Whatever the case may be – whether diversifying their market share, or radically shifting dimensions into a new one entirely – Samsung’s tablet is slated for release in October, which will coincide with the release of both Windows 8 and Microsoft’s Surface tablet. They’ll have a lot of work ahead of them; with both a new OS to tinker with, and a hardy market opponent in the form of the Surface, diversifying into the Windows tablet market will be an uphill struggle. But assuming they can overshadow their Microsoft competition, Samsung stand to gain substantial profits from this move!

Though Microsoft is one of the premier software companies in the world, and also has a proud history in manufacturing (producing high quality mice, keyboards, and – of course – the ultra-popular Xbox and Xbox 360 videogame consoles), its previous stance when it came to computers involved outsourcing the production of the hardware to different companies. But yesterday they announced that they will be both producing and programming their latest product: the Microsoft Surface Tablet, a device intended to uncompromisingly bridge the gap between the power of a P.C and the versatility and portability of a tablet computer. It’s a bold move: with Apple accounting for fully two thirds of the tablet market, it’s difficult to conceive of a company with no prior experience with computer manufacturing breaking successfully into the tablet market. But despite their comparative lack of experience, Microsoft have made a clever decision in deciding to take full control of their tablet computer; one similar to Apple’s recent decision to launch their own mapping system, rather than rely on Google Maps, or Samsung’s recent decision to utilize Bada instead of the Android OS on their entry level Smartphones – essentially, it’s not a great idea to rely on companies you’re in competition with in other areas. Both Apple and Samsung have a healthy mistrust of Google (proprietor of both Google Maps and the open source Android OS) because it has an impetus to harvest their customer’s data for advertising purposes: ergo, they are trying to become more self-sufficient, and cut Google off at the source (or at least stymie their efforts). Similarly, Microsoft could have outsourced hardware production to a company like Intel or Samsung, but by doing so they are essentially ‘sleeping with the enemy’. Additionally, by overseeing all aspects of both design and programming, Microsoft ensure that the Surface Tablet really is their device, custom made from the ground up and thus guaranteed to contain all of the features they desire. And what are those features, you may be wondering? Well, sadly, Microsoft hasn’t released all of the specifications for their device yet, but the ones they have are fairly promising. They pledge to create two versions of the Surface Tablet: a smaller and weaker variant (weighing 676g at 9.3mm thick, designed with Windows RT and low-power processors in mind), and the Pro version (weighing 903g at 13.5mm thick, running the standard Windows 8 OS and designed for standard Intel chipsets). Both, however, possess 10.6” HD screens, a case incorporating a thin (and optional) keyboard peripheral, and a kickstand so users can watch the screen without straining their hands. While the Pro tablet has a maximum of 128GB memory, the RT version has a peak of only half that (and its standard version is a mere quarter, at 32GB). The Microsoft press release that accompanied the unveiling states that the Surface Tablet has a full sized USB port, a 16:9 aspect ratio and 22 degrees angled edges, meaning that even the weaker RT version should have no issue with running full 1080p HD video.  So far, reaction to the device has been mixed. Most pundits are impressed by the design of the Surface Tablet: one stalwart Apple blogger even grudgingly conceded that Microsoft could make substantial money by simply revamping the Surface Tablet case for the iPad, since it is so innovative and attractive. But the prevailing opinion is that there are not enough details about the specifications to make an informed judgement about the Surface Tablet yet. And almost everybody feels that Microsoft may be jeopardizing its relationships with other companies (such as Samsung, manufacturer of a previous Microsoft tablet computer) – analyst Michael Gartenberg speculated that “Microsoft felt they could not rely on others to deliver on their vision for Windows 8 in mobile computing”. Will Microsoft’s former partners resent their decision to stand on their own two feet, and withdraw support? And if they did, would Microsoft be capable of producing their own hardware in the long term? And – most seriously of all – is the fledgling Surface capable of going head-to-head with the ubiquitous iPad and coming out on top? Only time can tell if Microsoft’s decision to diversify will be a good one.

When the mobile phone boom began, Nokia was one of the companies that profited inordinately. Cheap to manufacture and with ultra-competitive prices, Nokia’s initial range of mobiles propelled them to the enviable position of largest global mobile phone vendor – a position they managed to cling to for 14 years, from 1998 to 2012 (when they were finally dethroned by Samsung). However, the slow decline of Nokia began in 2007, after the Apple iPhone was unveiled for the first time. The iPhone was to prove the antithesis of Nokia’s own marketing strategy: costly, decadent, and ultra-modern, with a plethora of fringe features to appeal to both the casual user and the hardcore tinkerer. This new breed of mobile phones, since dubbed Smartphones, was to be a constant thorn in Nokia’s side; Smartphones were much more difficult and costly to manufacture than a run-of-the-mill mobile… and in many cases, also difficult to market. Companies like Apple and Samsung, which possess strong branding, were able to build up the concept of “lifestyle marketing” around their burgeoning Smartphone empires. Bundling an image with their devices led to bigger and bigger profit margins for the two industry giants; Nokia, with their budget mobiles and entry-level devices, fell further and further by the wayside. Without support from either iOS (Apple’s proprietary operating system) or Android (Google’s freely-distributed OS, which the vast preponderance of Smartphone’s – including Samsung’s - use), Nokia made a last-ditch attempt to buoy their ailing company and re-establish a foothold in the modern market: a February 2011 alliance with Microsoft, the computer giant which publishes Windows Phone, a much more modest alternative to the “big two” operating systems.  But even a strategic partnership with Microsoft hasn’t turned Nokia’s fortunes around, and they recently announced a number of dramatic cuts. 10,000 Nokia employees will be losing their jobs during this cull, which Nokia claim is the only way to preserve their struggling company. In addition, an unspecified number of manufacturing plants are to be shut down, there are to be numerous changes in personnel, and Nokia’s luxury phone brand Vertu - whose devices are made of ultra-expensive materials like gold, diamond and carbon fibre – is to be sold off to a third party. Nokia’s forecast for the future remains grim, however: they have predicted continued financial hardship for the remainder of the year, to “[a] somewhat greater extent than previously expected”. And we’re regretfully forced to concur, because cuts of this magnitude can often be devastating to a company: particularly a company like Nokia, intent on reclaiming their lost resources. By trimming the fat to such an extreme, Nokia may well have lost the capacity to compete on equal footing with their Android/Apple competitors, and doomed themselves to a slow degeneracy as a result. The numbers speak for themselves. While Samsung and Apple have gone from strength to strength (Samsung have sold 44.5 million in the Smartphone market this quarter, while Apple have sold 35 million), Nokia are increasingly falling behind (with sales of 12 million in the first quarter). Their stock value is at its lowest level since 1996, putting it at a sixteen year low. An August 2011 statement by Nokia’s US subsidiary head, Chris Weber, sums up their issue: “the reality is that if we’re not successful with Windows Phone, it really doesn’t matter what we do”. And as our earlier blog post on the topic establishes, Microsoft is not doing well in what amounts to a two-man war of the operating systems between Apple and Google. Though we regret to report this, if Nokia’s fortunes continue to decline, they may be forced to abandon their manufacturing business altogether and adopt a subsidiary role to a stronger company. But given their submissive role in their ‘partnership’ with Microsoft, some would argue that that’s already happened.

It’s easy to overlook Windows phones. Obviously, the iOS is incredibly well known: as Apple’s proprietary operating system, anyone who utilizes an iPhone is forced to adopt it as a matter of course. And its chief competitor, Google’s open-source Android OS, has gone from strength to strength recently, gaining an increased measure of traction due to the ease with which third-party developers can construct widgets, overlays and applications to complement its baseline software. Both operating systems, therefore, have clearly delineated positions in the marketplace: the proprietary closed-source iOS, tailor-made to Apple’s exacting specifications and intimately tied into their market branding initiative, counterpointing the looser, open-source Android, which is attractive specifically because it is so easy to adapt to radically different phones. The Windows OS, by contrast, has no clear position in this hierarchy: it lacks a distinct market identity of its own. Consequently, it is consistently overlooked by consumers. Though the platform is outsourced to different hardware vendors, in much the same way Android is, there’s no clear sense of that community that makes the Android such a singular experience; there’s a dearth of apps, and much fewer developers, compared to the Android’s surplus of both. There’s considerably less customization available as a consequence – meaning that despite having a business ideology similar to Google’s Android, the homogeneity and simplicity of the OS makes it seem a lot more like Apple’s. Compare and contrast this to the hardware of Windows phones, which, by and large, express the same degree of variation that you’ve come to expect from Android. The experience is not cohesive enough: it lacks the trademark focus of its competition. Microsoft is certainly attempting to make up for this deficit; they’ve been making a real push to expand their market lately, contributing huge amounts of money to developers and even, in some cases, giving away devices in order to ensure that the prospect of developing for their company seems as attractive as possible. They’ve also updated their design philosophy: with the advent of proprietary, functional software like Metro (a clean and minimalistic UI, with easy window toggling to reduce confusion while utilizing multiple applications) and Bing (a multi-input search engine function that allows you to seamlessly blend touchscreen, voice, and vision input to fluidly search for content), they seem to finally be developing a market identity of their own. Sadly, however, it still seems to be a market identity founded on the notion of compromise – compromise between the respective extremes of the open-source Android OS and the proprietary Apple iOS. Even at their most inventive, the Windows phone selection that presently exists is mid-range: mid-range in terms of specifications, mid-range in terms of price and, sadly, mid-range in terms of available features. Whether they can pick up the slack to eventually compete on an equal footing with their competitor’s remains to be seen; but, given the current climate of Smartphone development and programming, Microsoft would be better sticking to the desktop computer marketplace. It’s a shame; a greater range of Smartphones can only result in more choices for the consumer. But in this system dominated by only two companies, it seems that consumers aren’t interested in choice; they’re more concerned with brand recognition.