Since its launch in October 2012, Windows Phone 8 has been a question mark in the mobile OS world. Microsoft still trails Android and iOS significantly in mobile system market share, and stats show it's behind even BlackBerry.
But there are signs of hope for Microsoft's mobile ambitions - this week the company announced that Windows Phones outsold iPhones in seven countries during the fourth quarter of 2012. Granted, those nations included India, South Africa and Russia and not major markets like the U.S., but still, sales are sales.
Aside from the lag time in boosting numbers following the release of a whole new OS, a lack of competitive apps is no doubt holding Windows Phone back. Whereas Apple has 689,000 apps for the iPhone, the Windows Phone Store owns around 135,000 apps and games. There's still no Instagram, and the Store finally picked up Temple Run Wednesday, though, as Wired noted, not the up-to-date Temple Run 2 or Temple Run: Oz titles.
Curious about Windows Phone's plan for success, we sat down with Casey McGee, senior marketing manager at Microsoft, and Larry Lieberman, senior product manager, Windows Phone developer program, at GDC this week to get a read on the OS, what it's done right and how it plans to get where it wants to go.
Dev first approach
Both made much of Microsoft's developer-focused approach to games - we were at a game dev conference, after all - and noted that by allowing game devs to code natively while also giving them middleware like Unity and Marmalade to work with has fostered a robust creation environment.
"Larry and I are a little bit biased because of what we do for a living, but to us it really looks like we're the only ones that created a product with developers in mind," McGee said.
"I don't think anybody took the approach we did where we started over between Windows Mobile and Windows Phone and from day one we said, 'We need to create an amazing developer experience.'"
Developer interest accelerated with Windows Phone 8 as the platform became more open, the pair said. An internal promotion system has also translated to better app sales. While devs are happy making cash off their products, Lieberman said customers are benefiting from the dev-based approach too.
"The No. 1 guidance for Windows Phone since the very beginning has been to create an outstanding end-user experience," he said. "And apps are part of that outstanding user experience.
"We had to bring our developer expertise to the table in order to create that ecosystem that generates those apps, that generates that innovation that people expect and need because it's that long tail, right?
"On other platforms, an app gets installed and it's just an icon somewhere," Lieberman continued. "Most apps get installed and never get used again on other platforms. What we're trying to do is expose apps in contextually relevant ways."
He pointed to Lenses as a prime example of this contextual relevance - users can click on the Lens button to access apps that aren't only readily accessible, they make sense for what users want to use and when.
Clicking Lenses will take users to a set of apps that leverage a Windows Phone 8 handset's camera viewfinder, plus offer a path to the market place for more viewfinder-friendly apps.
It's not a two OS world
Lieberman and McGee aren't blind to the reality of the mobile OS hierarchy - "We understand the reality of the world today," Lieberman acknowledged - but both believe Windows Phone has a better-than-average chance to stake out a healthy place in the mobile ecosystem.
"We have said that our stated goal is to create a vibrant, differentiated third ecosystem in and of itself," McGee said. "And by that we mean something that is self-sustaining, something that is different from what is out there today.
"We went into a market where there [were] two very different ecosystems. You see what Apple is doing, you see what Google is doing. There are very different approaches, and we didn't think that either was quite right. We saw an opportunity for a third, and that's what we've done."
Market share is one indicator of success, he continued, but for Microsoft the hope seems to be generating a robust ecosystem, not claiming the top spot.
"Are you growing in more countries in sales? Are you growing the number of quality apps that people are looking for? Are you increasing customer satisfaction? Are you getting more partnerships, more innovation?" McGee asked. "All of those things are happening for Windows Phone."
Microsoft isn't content to play third fiddle, mind you, but Lieberman admitted the system has some catching up to do even if it is providing a differentiated OS option.
"What we've done is delivered something very different from what other folks have," he said. "We have a whole differentiated offering that gives people an interaction model that they can't get on any other platform."
Personalizing is key to the Windows Phone plot, he explained, as is the ability to access information users want faster than on other platforms.
"By far we're the most personal phone."
For all its plusses, there is still an glaring line drawn by OSes that have come before.
"From a time-based perspective, we launched our phone in 2010 and competitors had really shifted the paradigm around 2007, so there's a time delta there," Lieberman continued.
"[However], I think we have clearly defined ourselves as a third player in the ecosystem right now."
Never 100%
Pandora launched for Windows Phone 8 last week, fulfilling a promise made by Microsoft to bring the music app to life back in October.
Getting the app is a score for the platform, and it's able to take advantage of the filter features of Kids Corner to keep objectionable content out of youngsters' ears, but the absence of a major app like Instagram isn't helping Microsoft much.
Though he avoided specifics, McGee hinted that it and other popular applications could one day find themselves on Windows Phone.
"It's a work in progress," he said. "We're adding hundreds of titles every day. We find the majority of Windows Phone customers are buying the apps they're looking for, and they've gotten a great experience on Windows Phone.
"There are additional apps that we would love to add, and we're talking with a lot of folks."
Microsoft has a decent cache of exclusive content, he added, giving Windows Phone users experiences completely unique to the OS. And of course, nobody's perfect.
"At this point we feel that we've got just over 90 percent of the apps that people look for on both competing platforms," McGee said. "Those that we don't have, we've got our eye on. We'd love to bring those over as quickly as we can.
"But nobody has 100 percent of anybody. Nobody has every app that we've got. Apple doesn't have all the apps that Google has and vice versa. So it's important to calibrate for what's right for the platform.
"But taken as a whole, we feel we've got a good percentage of the sigfnificnat apps on other platforms as well as apps that behave better and differently on Windows Phone that you can't get anywhere else."
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