“Microsoft Corp. said on Wednesday it sold more than 2 million units of its new Windows Phone 7 software to handset makers last quarter, as it looks to counter Apple Inc’s iPhone,” Bill Rigby reports for Reuters.
MacDailyNews Take: To clarify, those weren’t 2 million “sales” of Windows Phone ’07 units to end sufferers, they were simply 2 million licenses to Microsoft’s handset “partners” such as HTC, LG, and (bah!) Dell.
Rigby continues, “Apple said last week 16.2 million iPhones were sold in the last quarter. Microsoft is set to report quarterly earnings on Thursday.”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Fred Mertz” for the heads up.]
Anything to hold on to his title as CEO.
Microsoft is praying the courts bring the hammer down on Android…
——RM
I have not heard any news of beleaguered Dell since the Streak was slapped down by consumers. Are they still in business?
And, we know that at least 1M and more likely 1.5M were just to fill the channel. Actual sellthru might have been as low as 500k.
2 Millions License and 1.999 Million Phones sitting unsold on store shelves form the release date of Windows Phone 7, does not compete with 16.2 Million iPhones sold last quarter.
MDN Word “dead”, as in Ballmer is a dead CEO walking
Only nine more quarters to go till they get back to 2007 levels of WinMo license sales.
In other words,
1,800,000 windows mobile 7 phones still on the shelves at retailers.
And wasn’t it like 100k+ ms crap 7 phones were given to employees?
So less than 100k phones actually sold in the world.
The supply channels had been purged of Windows Mobile 6.5 devices so 2 million will be restocking, lets see what the next quarters numbers are. Given that Amazon had to resort to selling Windows 7 phones for $0.01 it doesn’t look promising. Anyone know how many WinMo devices they sold in the same quarter of 2009?
What is this? The MDN puppet show?
Anyone here with an original idea at all?
Or will we just spew the same old crap that the little boy who runs this site feeds us?
@howdy!
Well…could you give us an example of “an original idea”?
2 million licenses sold to partners doesn’t say anything about how many phones have even been produced yet. I’m sure not a single one of microsoft’s partners has produced enough Windows Phone ’07 handsets to use up all the licenses they bought from Microsoft.
@howdy: Sorry you’re hurting so bad.
This is pure entertainment. The world would be disappointed if Microsoft didn’t trot out their tired old numbers tricks to try and convince themselves they are not sliding backwards so fast.
Troubling for them must be they know WP7’s failure must presage the decline of W7 – without the whole ecosystem, stagnation turns to decay.
We went through all this with the zune. Almost all of their “sales” with that device turned out to be sent to warehouses, store shelves, convention and conference give-aways, etc.
In tomorrow’s report, expect a lot of mystery regarding the vintage and divisional sources of earnings.
I’ll bet that those initial licenses were sold at “introductory special” prices too.
Windows 7 …..
What year is this?
For Microsoft, a “sale” is someone paying the license fee. So I think it is legitimate for them to say they sold 2 million “units,” if that’s how many license fees were paid. However many actual phones were sold, I’m actually glad it isn’t not a total flop, a la Kin.
Poor Microsoft… It’s been a tough decade. First, they abandon the ambitious “Longhorn” project (after years of effort) and cobble together Windows Vista from existing Windows code, to “counter” Intel Macs with Mac OS X. Just as they release it, Apple steals the spotlight with iPhone. After scrambling for the next three+ years to counter iPhone (with release of Windows Phone 7), Apple steals the show once again with the “real deal” for the next decade, iPad (and iOS). And all Microsoft has after a decade of work is a bloated desktop OS and a PDA-class OS for smartphones, with nothing that works well “in between.” Unfortunately for Microsoft, that “in between” segment is the growth story for the next ten years.
Microsoft (under Steve Ballmer) = Total manipulation by Apple (Steve Jobs)
It’s amazing how many people get it wrong. Just check out the news links on the left side of the page to read “Microsoft ships 2 million Windows Phone 7 handsets in holiday quarter” each and every time when everyone knows Microsoft doesn’t make the handsets!
Microsoft’s playing the reporters and they’re falling for it.
Windows is a gaming OS. Always has been. Microsoft is a game company. They should stop fantasizing and stick to their guns.
MS sells 2M licenses at the price of not suing the OEMs for IP violations.
At that rate, I’m surprised the number wasn’t larger. In a few quarters I’d expect the number to equal then dwindling Android sells.
Microsoft had a good idea when they originally revealed Vista, but the plan was based on Vista and all future Windows versions running on EFI firmware instead of the old BIOS system.
Apple entered the equation when they changed to Intel CPU operating on EFI firmware.
This posed a major issue for Microsoft. If Vista continued on the EFI firmware plan, all third party expansion hardware designed for Windows machines, could work on Macs.
Bad news for Microsoft as it could lead PC users to buying and upgrading Macs instead of Window boxes.
Microsoft has been hampered ever since then. They can’t go down the EFI route without opening up all expansion hardware to Mac users. Unless they do go down the EFI route, they are hampered by the now ancient BIOS boot system.
So, Windows based machines will never boot up as fast as a Mac.
What has this to do with Windows Phone 7? Well, the knock on effect from this holding onto old BIOS booting, sow Microsoft are unwilling to adapt. The Balllmer run outfit believes they can sit onto their current market share and keep going. They never took Apple seriously and have been left behind in the innovation stakes.
Laughing at the iPhone when Apple launched it showed just how out of touch Ballmer was. He didn’t see the potential of the original iPhone and the ecosystem that was already built around it.
I’m pleased for Microsoft that they have sold @ 2 million Windows Phone 7 licences. At least it repays some of the development costs, but not all.
What Microsoft (or any other competitor to Apple) needs to accept is the smartphone / tablet world is now Apple’s. There is no point in trying to compete. Nobody can as they just don’t have the ecosystem in place to even start to compete.
Apple started the iTunes ecosystem @ 10 years ago. It’s taken 8 – 10 years to get the iTunes ecosystem to the level of success it enjoys now.
Potential or would be Apple competitors listen up: the next decade belongs to Apple. If you want to hit back, start looking at the next decade and innovate devices and an ecosystem to compete with iTunes. Until you have that in place, anything you launch, no matter how high spec’d will fail as there is no polished one stop shop to support your devices.
That’s why Apple wins. They listen and innovate and look to the next big thing. Everybody else has just missed the next big thing. When Jobs revealed the iPad, PC pundits scoffed, ” a device for a market that doesn’t exist” and “who needs it” were banded around from every angle.
With idiots like that dealing out reviews and opinions to the PC industry, no wonder the PC industry is being left behind in this new TOUCH world, successfully relaunched by Apple in 2007 with the iPhone.
Awesome post Obi, you nailed it!
What’s the matter, howdy? Does it hurt when Microsoft’s spin tactics are revealed?
@Obi
Boom!
How about them Apples howdy! ?