The time of Microsoft on the smartphone market is coming to an end – the company officially stops further development of the Windows Phone platform and cancelled the production of all devices running it. The confirmation was published on the Twitter page of Microsoft’s vice president of operating systems Joe Belfiore.
The operating system Windows Phone was introduced in 2010 replacing Windows Mobile. Despite company’s efforts, it never became very popular in the next few years. According to the analytics company IDC, in the first quarter of 2017 the share of devices on Windows Phone in the world market accounted for only 0.1% of sales.
According to Belfiore, the development of Windows 10 Mobile is no longer among Microsoft’s priorities. One of the reasons for it was the fact that mobile app developers didn’t release versions of their apps for Windows Phone due to its small share on the market. At the same time, Belfiore mentioned that the company will continue to support the platform and release updates with fixed bugs.
Interestingly, some experts say that this isn’t the end for Microsoft in this segment – the company will allegedly release a full-fledged Windows 10 version for smartphones next year. In any case, we’ll see if Microsoft decides to stay on the market.
