No new flagships till Q3 2015?

[Ruined]

Maybe they are purposely not releasing a flagship to give HTC some business.

 

[Marquis de Faux]

This comment is US based.

Nokia never had a strong foothold in the States for various reasons which are not part of this discussion. The idea of constantly wanting flagships under the Lumia brand is Ill-advised, in my opinion. BlackBerry is a brand with a lot more prestige here and yet Chen is keeping Passport numbers purposely low. Flagship Nokias simply have not sold well in the US and even with Microsoft branding this trend is not likely to continue......unless.

Unless Microsoft hits a Giancarlo Stanton homerun with Windows 10, it's not in their best interest to pop out some more WP8.1 high-end phones that will (A) not be pushed by carriers, and (B) not make a dent against Android or iOS in terms of function or market segment. We may as well wait for W10 and see what the One Windows philosophy really is.

I agree with all this, but what about the current Windows Phone customers that have no device to upgrade to? What about the people who were brought to Windows Phone with budget devices and are now looking for a high end upgrade? There needs to be at least one phone for these people or they will switch to Android.

 

[nallWhite]

MS seems to have a all in strategy for everything. Also, the current CEO wasn't a fan of them buying Nokia's handset unit. He wants them to be a software company before anything else. So, I don't see any push from the top to get anything out soon.

 

[doob9911]

:winktongue: Who knows. Samsung may launch new Ativ flagship. Ativ S2

 

[fdalbor]

This is a killer of a situation for Microsoft. They are pushing for the low end to build the mid-high in the future. I can understand that and commend them for the effort. The problem becomes when you don't have anything for your previous customers to upgrade to and you lose them. So what have you gained. Most of the people who buy Apple phones are people who bought them before. They are keeping their customers content; Microsoft is not. Most people don't care if their next phone is the best on the planet. But they do want it to be better than the one they had before. That is where Apple has been successfull. Of course they have the market share to prove that strategy works. While they only have 13% or so of the market; they hang onto that 13% and sell their old customers the next little bit better phone. If Microsoft had taken the 925, gave it a quad core 800, added a SD card and made a few improvements and sold it for about the same as the original 925 I believe they would have had a good replacement for the people who are now dropping the mark. But what do I know.

 

[fatclue_98]

I agree with all this, but what about the current Windows Phone customers that have no device to upgrade to? What about the people who were brought to Windows Phone with budget devices and are now looking for a high end upgrade? There needs to be at least one phone for these people or they will switch to Android.

You mean there's no flagship Lumia to upgrade to. I'm not singling you out per se, but most of the comments I read make it sound like there's no other WP device unless it's a Lumia. That's part of the problem within our own base. The Ativ SE on Verizon shreds most of the Lumias on specs alone. Camera notwithstanding, the M8 is a solid device that was launched very recently and came out of the box with 8.1 Update. I don't blame other OEMs for not devoting any resources to the platform since the users don't, or won't, support them. Nadella is NOT a hardware guy like Ballmer was and y'all better wake up to the fact that there may NOT be many Lumias coming down the pike. Does Google commission a new Nexus every six months? No. Does Apple release a new iPhone every six months? No. So what gives?

 

[chenhogi]

This is a killer of a situation for Microsoft. They are pushing for the low end to build the mid-high in the future. I can understand that and commend them for the effort. The problem becomes when you don't have anything for your previous customers to upgrade to and you lose them. So what have you gained. Most of the people who buy Apple phones are people who bought them before. They are keeping their customers content; Microsoft is not. Most people don't care if their next phone is the best on the planet. But they do want it to be better than the one they had before. That is where Apple has been successfull. Of course they have the market share to prove that strategy works. While they only have 13% or so of the market; they hang onto that 13% and sell their old customers the next little bit better phone. If Microsoft had taken the 925, gave it a quad core 800, added a SD card and made a few improvements and sold it for about the same as the original 925 I believe they would have had a good replacement for the people who are now dropping the mark. But what do I know.

Very good post.

 

[ALpHa.Q.RoUgH]

What is the definition of a flagship to some people I'm curious especially to those who are still with a 920?

There has been the:

Samsung Ativ SE
Lumia 930
HTC M8 for Windows
Lumia 1520
Lumia 1020

I mean that's a ton of options.

What exactly are you waiting for?

The 1520 came out a little more than a year ago, 1020 a year and a half ago and the M8 like 5 months ago.

 

[Laura Knotek]

There has been the:

Samsung Ativ SE

Verizon only--I have AT&T

Lumia 930

Not available in the US

HTC M8 for Windows

No way to block unwanted calls/texts

Lumia 1520

Too big for me

Lumia 1020

Same processor as in 920--camera is only better feature.

I mean that's a ton of options.

What exactly are you waiting for?

That's why I'm still waiting.

 

[undisputed n00b]

Maybe they are purposely not releasing a flagship to give HTC some business.

No. They gave HTC a chance with the 8x and they blew it by basically abandoning the phone as soon as it launched and support for updates have been abysmal as well. Everybody knows if you want a WP to only buy a Lumia and nothing else.

 

[Evronian]

MS seems to have a all in strategy for everything. Also, the current CEO wasn't a fan of them buying Nokia's handset unit. He wants them to be a software company before anything else. So, I don't see any push from the top to get anything out soon.

I'm starting to think that Microsoft doesn't really care about WP. All their services are available on the other platforms and some of those apps are even better than WP ones. The Icon was released 10 months ago and as of now there are no news of upcoming flagship devices. The competition has phones with better hardware, better apps and running all those Ms services we use on our Lumias. Microsoft is simply giving no reason to stick with them to its customers. And that's a shame cause I really love the OS and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

 

[Jose_Rey]

:winktongue: Who knows. Samsung may launch new Ativ flagship. Ativ S2

I wish!

 

[Jose_Rey]

@RaRa85

That's how I feel. Apps are night and day in comparison to WP, but I LOVE that Metro look of WP! I'm debating whether to return my phone and get an M8. The thing holding me back is the price at the moment. I was hoping to get one under 400 for AT&T.

 

[realwarder]

Just the same rumors still spinning.

Only Microsoft know the answer... time will tell. I wouldn't care so much if you could buy the phones they're actually released in the USA (930/735)

 

[FeedTheShark]

To me the problem is that MS have inherited a bizarre release schedule from Nokia. Nokia (much as I love/d them) often seemed to release phones at arbitrary times of the year, dotting the calendar with releases with no apparent logic. Why did the 925 come out 6 months after the 920? Why was the 1520 released with Icon/930 and not called the 1530 since it has the same processor? Why did they have to wait another 6 months for the 730/830? And they always had the issue of announce and only make available for sale months later.

What I think (hope!) MS are doing is following Qualcomm's release schedule. The 810 chip is coming Q1 2014, Samsung will use it for the Galaxy S6, HTC for the new M8, Sony for the Z4, LG for their flagship Android, etc, etc. If MS had released a 940, 1040, 1540 (or whatever) this year they'd be running the 805 and within months be behind the Android competition spec-for-spec. That has always been the case, and while you can argue WP doesn't need the power whereas Android does, too many people do go by processor. Add to that the fact W10 is coming late summer, you'll actually get more benefit from the 810 when you upgrade.

So sure it's annoying there's no flagship now, but I think it makes sense to wait til MWC or CES to announce their flagships running the latest hardware and be on par with other OEMs than to have released something for the holiday season and 920/1020 owners who are at the ends of their contracts. Obviously they cannot talk about it yet, if they announced sales of existing 930s would plummet. So that's my hope, new flagships announced in a month or so - they don't need to wait for Windows 10, just for the Qualcomm 810.

 

[Evronian]

Just the same rumors still spinning.

Only Microsoft know the answer... time will tell. I wouldn't care so much if you could buy the phones they're actually released in the USA (930/735)

If I wanted a mid range phone I would've bought one it the first place. So I'm not going to change my 920 with a 735. As for the 930, my contract is due in June and by that time the 930 will be 1 and a half years old. Nobody wants to get a 30months contract with a phone that old.

 

[Cryio]

They missed the bandwagon and want to release a SD810 phone to coincide with the release of W10.

 

[RaRa85]

What is the definition of a flagship to some people I'm curious especially to those who are still with a 920?

There has been the:

Samsung Ativ SE
Lumia 930
HTC M8 for Windows
Lumia 1520
Lumia 1020

I mean that's a ton of options.

What exactly are you waiting for?

The 1520 came out a little more than a year ago, 1020 a year and a half ago and the M8 like 5 months ago.

And which one of those phones can be obtained readily through any carrier? Drum roll please...one. That is the problem. People aren't going to continue to buy phones outright when the competition is easily accessible through the carrier and no one knows what direction WP is going in. Seriously Microsoft cannot afford to move at a snails pace while offering $50 phones in the meantime. I had to buy the HTC Focus, HTC Titan, Lumia 920 and 1020 all from eBay and go through the process of getting them unlocked for my carrier. The average consumer is not going to go through the hassle. I was a diehard WP guy at the time but the cancelled McLaren did it for me especially when they could release current hardware like the Lumia 1520/930 on carriers without a recent flagship and still chose not to. That's when I jumped ship. And I've come to realize how far app development needs to go now that I'm on a different platform.

Posted via the Windows Phone Central App for Android

 

[RaRa85]

@RaRa85

That's how I feel. Apps are night and day in comparison to WP, but I LOVE that Metro look of WP! I'm debating whether to return my phone and get an M8. The thing holding me back is the price at the moment. I was hoping to get one under 400 for AT&T.

Yeah it's true. What phone do you own now? I'm using the Z3 and I love it.

Posted via the Windows Phone Central App for Android

 

[nohra]

The first basic principle of business is the time value of money: having a specific amount of money today is worth more than having that same amount in the future. My Nokia Lumia 920 is still a solid phone that is better than a lot phones on the market and I am just going to be hanging onto it and not getting anything new. Without anything to even tempt me to spend my money on, Microsoft and the other OEMs are putting the benefit of time value of money in my hands, and they are losing it by the simple fact that I am going to earn interest on the money I'm setting aside for a phone down the road. The product game may be to sell now-sell now-sell now, but there's no sales happening in the near future here.

That said, if HTC put a Lumia 1020-spec camera into the One M8, I would probably have already bought it by now! That phone looks great, but the camera is going to be what determines my next phone. Of course, in the same line, if Microsoft comes out with a Lumia 1020 successor that looks sweet like the One, but has the camera and camera button that the HTC lacks, they will make a sale for sure.

I guess it's fortunate for us that the 920 was built like a tank!