NEW YORK - After years of declining sales of phones based on Microsoft Corp.'s Windows Mobile software, the company is starting with a fresh slate - a completely new operating system for phones.
The new handsets will go up against Apple Inc.'s highly popular iPhone and the expanding number of phones running on Google Inc.'s Android operating system.
The first phone with Windows Phone 7 will be the Samsung Focus, which hits AT&T Inc. stores Nov. 8 for $200 with a two-year contract requirement, Microsoft said Monday. It will be closely followed by two more phones for AT&T, made by LG Electronics Inc. and HTC Corp., and one for T-Mobile USA, also made by HTC.
In May, Microsoft launched another new phone-software package, Kin, only to yank it about two months later in the face of dismal sales. Windows Phone 7 is a different beast.
In all, Microsoft announced nine phones for the U.S. market on Monday, including one from Dell Inc., and it has lined up 60 carriers in 30 countries to carry Windows 7 phones.
Another U.S. carrier, Sprint Nextel Corp., is getting a Windows 7 phones in the first half of next year.
In the most recent quarter, Microsoft's older system, Windows Mobile, accounted for just 5 percent of the worldwide smartphone market. That compares with 41 percent for Symbian (mainly used by Nokia Corp.), 18 percent for Research in Motion Ltd.'s BlackBerry phones, 17 percent for Android and 14 percent for the iPhone, according to research firm Gartner Inc.
From a hardware standpoint, the Windows 7 phones are indistinguishable from high-end Android phones: They have big touch screens, and a few models have slide-out keyboards.
But Microsoft has given the software a different look. It is centered around "tiles" on the front screen that are supposed to tell the user at a glance about important new information, such as e-mail and Facebook status updates.
For example, a weather program might show a constantly updated snapshot of weather conditions; photo or music libraries would be represented by a recent snapshot or the cover of the last album played on the device.
Both the iPhone and Android are fundamentally more application-centered. However, some companies including Motorola Inc. have designed overlay software for Android that's reminiscent of Windows Phone 7's information-at-glance idea.
"We want you to get in, get out and back to your life," Microsoft CEO Steven Ballmer said at a launch event in New York. He called it "a very different kind of phone."
Gartner analyst Carolina Milanesi said the user interface is "a huge improvement" over Windows Mobile, but Microsoft "is catching up with the competition rather than leapfrogging it."
by Peter Svensson Associated Press Oct. 12, 2010 12:00 AM
Microsoft bets big on new smartphone software
