What will happen to Nokia Apps?

[Xtian.Castro]

Has anyone else commented or discussed what will happen with all of Nokia's custom apps?

Personally I specifically purchased a Nokia WP because of the companies' enthusiasm for the OS. They made killer hardware with always improving custom apps and I'm afraid the MSFT purchase is going to kill that. Don't get me wrong I'm sure MSFT is committed to WP success, but they are slow. At least too slow for my tastes. Nokia had a culture of curiosity and experimentation. Some of their now famous apps and services were born out of beta projects by engineers and programmers who just wanted to see if something "worked". MSFT is well know for scrapping R&D projects left and right. Not to mention the long list of missing features from WP in its current form.

I don't know guys, what are your thoughts?

 

[realwarder]

a) Nokia is not changing in any big way until next year when the deal is closed
b) From what Microsoft say, Nokia will remain the mobile arm so will likely just be a better funded group of the same people as now, likely working even closer with the existing WP engineers.
c) Microsoft need Windows Phone to succeed. That is need. The future (and even today) is mobile, and to be relevant they need to be in this space. They've proven with the Xbox/360 they can come back from being the underdog.
d) I'm looking forward to Microsoft effectively gaining 30,000 mobile engineers and pushing WP forward quickly.

 

[Xpider_MX]

Nothing, they will continue supporting.

 

[JamesDax]

This^

 

[Xtian.Castro]

The point I was making was that with Nokia's resources being folded into MSFT hardware and WP development, what chance do the quirky customized apps have when they're going to put those people to work on WP development at large?

While MSFT introduces a handful of cool features with a major release yearly or longer, Nokia was pumping out things almost monthly. Don't forget that those Nokia employees will now be MSFT employees working on WP.

 

[doubleodon]

Another branch of your original question would be:
Will the acquisition of Nokia by Microsoft make the non-Nokia phones more marginalized, or less?

As an HTC 8X owner I would hope for the latter.
In several instances Nokia has already toned down their exclusivity for the sake of the Windows Phone ecosystem, and I would hope the Microsoft would eliminate the exclusivity completely.
Alternate points of view?

 

[Cleavitt76]

The point I was making was that with Nokia's resources being folded into MSFT hardware and WP development, what chance do the quirky customized apps have when they're going to put those people to work on WP development at large?

While MSFT introduces a handful of cool features with a major release yearly or longer, Nokia was pumping out things almost monthly. Don't forget that those Nokia employees will now be MSFT employees working on WP.

I don't think it's likely that all of Nokia's developers are going to be moved into the Windows Phone OS team. OS programming is quite different from app programming. Developers tend to specialize in certain areas and their experience in those areas is very valuable. Nokia's app developers will continue to be app developers for MS and I think most of the existing Nokia apps will continue to live on.

In the long term I'm sure former Nokia employees will change roles or transfer to other areas, but that happens within MS and Nokia already. Some Nokia apps may get rebranded, merged with their MS versions over time, or even become the default app for the OS. However, I don't think the results from Nokia that we have seen in the past year are going to go away. If anything, that same group of people will now be better funded, have direct access to the WP OS team, and be under the same management umbrella.

Also, you mentioned that MS is slow and Nokia is fast. I don't really agree with that. In general, MS is moving faster than any other tech company out there. In the past year they have released major versions of nearly every one of their products (including a lot of business software that consumers typically don't know about) along with a lot of new products. Their development of WP may seem a little slow, but keep in mind that MS has a multi-billion dollar deal (an existing deal, not the new buyout) with Nokia to advance the WP platform by creating hardware, developing apps, and advertising. Part of the reason that Nokia appears to be doing a better job than MS at advancing WP is because Nokia has been "contracted" by MS to take the lead so that MS can focus on the low level stuff that consumers don't get to see (like OS internals, ecosystem integration efforts, backend service improvements). Nokia has done a great job and I can't imagine that the same former Nokia workforce won't do an even better job for WP when they are actually part of the MS team.