Surface Phone : When? The Answer

[techiez]

Why don't you understand without a Surface Phone like device, ms will be doomed?? and no company certainly wants that.

surface pro like tablets won't save the company in the long run. ms now realizes that without a mobile ground (where developers are) how difficult it is for them to establish their own groundbreaking innovation like hololens has been!!! mobile will play the key role of ms existence. ms knows this. by today or by the near future, ms has to win mobile. that's why surface phone argument is still going..

you want a surface phone but not MS, MS is not so deperate and hence its focus on cloud and enterprise. During the recent build, they even stopped saying mobile first cloud first, its all out cloud now,

and as for mobile focus, MS is building an ecosystem around IOS and Android devices, it is trying to connect ios and android to w10. MS will win mobile with deeper integration of windows with ios and android.

As for your argument abt full windows on mobile, full windows doesnt give the same convenience and use cases as a smartphone OS with apps. W10M already has a browser, has it replaced the app thirst for W10M users? Does my bank develop applications for full windows? I want basic photo editing apps when I quickly want beautify a photo, a full adobe suit is not a replacement for that, I still have to be on my pc to use photoshop when I need it. why do see ppl whining abt horrible facebook app on w10m, y dont they just use facebook mobile website?

and I still need a 800-1000$ laptop for a decent windows experience, 500$ laptops are slow and you think mobile hardware will give you smooth experience with full windows?

Now coming to CShell, it will make the current continuum implementation obsolete, and will mimic a desktop type experience. do anyone who needs a pc for light work can use his phone with continuum as a replacement but it still needs a space monitor, keyboard and mouse, if you try to run something like eclipse on a phone for programming, it will be a horrible experience and thats why I dont forsee CShell or full windows on a phone to be suddenly becoming a huge hit n hit ios and google markets.

 

[techiez]

Also theoretically CShell sounds lucrative but in layman terms it is similar to the adaptive/responsive websites, which adapt to the screen and I've how beautiful it can be but also how horrible it can be in some cases, same goes for CShell.

 

[xFalk]

2018 is the game changer for Microsoft Mobile! Live or die? Is the Surface Phone coming? with killer hardware? and all the best MSFT 1st party apps? and all the top 3rd party apps? available everywhere iPhone 8, Pixel 2, Note 8 are sold? With the biggest marketing campaigns man ever seen? (((Surface Phone))) or (((Surface Note))) or (((Surface Mobile))) or something....

I've been holding on to my L822 for 5 years now (anticipating, hoping, wishing, sweating, crying). Not sure I'll make it past 2018 if Microsoft doesn't come out with a replacement by then.

 

[fatclue_98]

Why don't you understand without a Surface Phone like device, ms will be doomed?? and no company certainly wants that.

surface pro like tablets won't save the company in the long run. ms now realizes that without a mobile ground (where developers are) how difficult it is for them to establish their own groundbreaking innovation like hololens has been!!! mobile will play the key role of ms existence. ms knows this. by today or by the near future, ms has to win mobile. that's why surface phone argument is still going..

With all due respect, your enthusiasm is commendable but you're slightly delusional if you think Microsoft's fortunes are tied to a mobile device. Microsoft is inching its way back to what made them the juggernaut they are - software and services. Let's be honest, with the exception of the x86 Surface line, their previous attempts as a manufacturer have been colossal failures. I'm talking about Kin, Zune, RT Surface and recent Lumias.

 

[Drael646464]

I think consumers interest(driven by apps availability) towards wp is the proof

That's an assumption (app availability), not a proof. Consumer interest as I pointed out is not some rational deductive process. Most consumers don't even know what storage or cpu their phones have, its unlikely they have some folio on which apps are available. How is that even supposed to work, lol?

I don't have a degree on material engineering. so I can't tell what folding screens be made of. If it's too much expensive for consumer, then I have to believe ms/lg/samsung are working on alternatives like dual/triple screens and of coursely ms, bcoz they have that kind of patents.

Yeah, I think they are working on an alternative too. The patent, and the windows code a twitter user found, suggests a dual screen device, with a magnetic hinge (under the title project Andromeda). In fact FOUR credible pieces of evidence converge on this.

1) project Andromeda, and the code that has been found for that in two places - one that lists Andromeda as having two separate sets of gyros and a hinge value, and another that lists Andromeda along side win10m and other windows skus under composable shell.
2) Two the patent, which shows a magnetic detachable hinge, like the code does, as well as an adaptive design, like the code does.
3) Insiders have specifically said, to thurott, that msft is working on a mobile device that runs a new windows sku, specifically in their words "a branch of win10m", which matches it being listed beside win10m, in the composable shell code.
4) In the aspirational videos, MSFT actually shows such a device, with two detachable clamshell screens, that can operate separately, or side by side.

In many ways, the surface book makes way for this sort of interopability while detached.

But such a device will have a gap/crease, and most likely the UI will need to be optimised for that, and not just for using it as one big screen.

Think westworld tablet, or the aspiration video they released, where you have separate things running on each screen, or a UI divided where the screen meets the gap/crease.

In that respect its not QUITE what people are usually imagining when they think folding tablet. Its more of a multitasking device.

 

[Drael646464]

I think consumers interest(driven by apps availability) towards wp is the proof

That's an assumption (app availability), not a proof. Consumer interest as I pointed out is not some rational deductive process. Most consumers don't even know what storage or cpu their phones have, its unlikely they have some folio on which apps are available. How is that even supposed to work, lol?

I don't have a degree on material engineering. so I can't tell what folding screens be made of. If it's too much expensive for consumer, then I have to believe ms/lg/samsung are working on alternatives like dual/triple screens and of coursely ms, bcoz they have that kind of patents.

Yeah, I think they are working on an alternative too. The patent, and the windows code a twitter user found, suggests a dual screen device, with a magnetic hinge (under the title project Andromeda). In fact FOUR credible pieces of evidence converge on this.

1) project Andromeda, and the code that has been found for that in two places - one that lists Andromeda as having two separate sets of gyros and a hinge value, and another that lists Andromeda along side win10m and other windows skus under composable shell.
2) Two the patent, which shows a magnetic detachable hinge, like the code does, as well as an adaptive design, like the code does.
3) Insiders have specifically said, to thurott, that msft is working on a mobile device that runs a new windows sku, specifically in their words "a branch of win10m", which matches it being listed beside win10m, in the composable shell code.
4) In the aspirational videos, MSFT actually shows such a device, with two detachable clamshell screens, that can operate separately, or side by side.

In many ways, the surface book makes way for this sort of interopability while detached.

But such a device will have a gap/crease, and most likely the UI will need to be optimised for that, and not just for using it as one big screen.

Think westworld tablet, or the aspiration video they released, where you have separate things running on each screen, or a UI divided where the screen meets the gap/crease.

In that respect its not QUITE what people are usually imagining when they think folding tablet. Its more of a multitasking device.

 

[imsai0]

Doubtful.
.

doubtful? lol. a software company like ms badly needs developers.

Microsoft will be fine with it's profitable PRODUCTS

really? windows is no longer their cash cow. just office & cloud won't gonna save the company in the long run.

 

[Guytronic]

a software company like ms badly needs developers.

OK... Lol...
You do know that MS is sitting on massive amounts of liquidable cash right now.

I believe the amount is somewhere around $129 billion USD.
Long term debt payoff is estimated at $65-$71 billion.

Today MS could be debt free after payoffs and still have $50 billion left.
Fifty billion could hire and pay a lot of good developers.

You act like Microsoft needs to be saved.
I don't see how a venture loss benefits Microsoft in any way at all.

 

[imsai0]

MS will win mobile with deeper integration of windows with ios and android.

ms will win? how? without a platform ?

As for your argument abt full windows on mobile, full windows doesnt give the same convenience and use cases as a smartphone OS with apps. W10M already has a browser, has it replaced the app thirst for W10M users? Does my bank develop applications for full windows? I want basic photo editing apps when I quickly want beautify a photo, a full adobe suit is not a replacement for that, I still have to be on my pc to use photoshop when I need it. why do see ppl whining abt horrible facebook app on w10m, y dont they just use facebook mobile website?

and I still need a 800-1000$ laptop for a decent windows experience, 500$ laptops are slow and you think mobile hardware will give you smooth experience with full windows?

what? why u need a pc when u have a pc in ur hand? have u eever heard about Windows on ARM? when unfolded, the SP will be at least 10" device. (5"*2)

Now coming to CShell, it will make the current continuum implementation obsolete, and will mimic a desktop type experience. do anyone who needs a pc for light work can use his phone with continuum as a replacement but it still needs a space monitor, keyboard and mouse, if you try to run something like eclipse on a phone for programming, it will be a horrible experience and thats why I dont forsee CShell or full windows on a phone to be suddenly becoming a huge hit n hit ios and google markets.


Also theoretically CShell sounds lucrative but in layman terms it is similar to the adaptive/responsive websites, which adapt to the screen and I've how beautiful it can be but also how horrible it can be in some cases, same Cshell.

Again you are repeating the same thing. why u need keyboard? why u need continuum? Cshell horrible? where? have u ever tried it? arguing without valid point is useless

 

[imsai0]

With all due respect, your enthusiasm is commendable but you're slightly delusional if you think Microsoft's fortunes are tied to a mobile device. Microsoft is inching its way back to what made them the juggernaut they are - software and services. .

Soft? okay. remove windows from Microsoft's history and then imagine Microsoft!! I might be delusional. but mobiles are where developers are!!

 

[Drael646464]

doubtful? lol. a software company like ms badly needs developers.

really? windows is no longer their cash cow. just office & cloud won't gonna save the company in the long run.

This is far from correct.

Actually MSFT position is more stable than apple or google. Both of those companies get 90-85 percent plus of their income from one revenue stream. Should that revenue stream (iPhone for apple, or advertising on search for google), be threatened or replaced by other products, their whole business model and company direction will need desperate re-evaluation.

MSFT by contrast has a diverse portfolio of income. They make money from xbox, from game houses, from azure, from services, from hardware, from the OS, cloud storage - their income is quite evenly distributed.

There is actually more certainty in MSFTs future, economically, as much money and liquid income as the other guys have, if that one domino falls over, or loses momentum, its question mark time.

 

[Drael646464]

Soft? okay. remove windows from Microsoft's history and then imagine Microsoft!! I might be delusional. but mobiles are where developers are!!

No, mobile is not where developers are. Most app makers for mobile platforms make pennies. People spend very little on mobile apps. The major development companies all develop for PC and console. The game industry, for example, on PC and console, makes more money than the movie industry.

Only the top ten app makers on mobile platforms get decent dollars. PC software can go for 100 plus dollars. People are reluctant to spend 4 bucks on a mobile app. If "mobile was where the developers are", EA, Microsoft studios, square enix, adobe and others would all stop writing for the more profitable PC and console industry and start making exclusively mobile apps.

This is just completely wrong.

 

[Drael646464]

why u need keyboard?

For decent text input. Shape and touch typing writing is vastly inferior. This is why business people don't use keyboardless tablets, and why PC keyboards haven't been replaced with flat capacitive plates. It's why hybrid devices exist.

If your inputing a lot of text, you want a keyboard. If your aiming for accuracy and precision, you want a mouse or a stylus. Touch is not the best, its just the most portable/casual.

 

[imsai0]

OK... Lol...
You do know that MS is sitting on massive amounts of liquidable cash right now.

I believe the amount is somewhere around $129 billion USD.
Long term debt payoff is estimated at $65-$71 billion.

Today MS could be debt free after payoffs and still have $50 billion left.

Fifty billion could hire and pay a lot of good developers.

inspite of having the large amount of money, inspite of paying them,,
ms couldn't manage to get developers support their wp platform, let alone paying a lot of developers!!!

Mobile is lost for ms and leaving it will be the best path for the company

okay. without a platform, without developers support. just imagine Microsoft's history and earnings.. Microsoft will be nowhere to be found now.

Seeing some of ur invalid arguments, I have a bad feeling for u. u either don't wanna see Microsoft in the long run or u r just a google nerd. I will be happy if I'm proved wrong.

 

[Drael646464]

I am no economist, and I can't vouch for the accuracy of these numbers, or my understanding of them, but for a rough idea. On fact I am positive I am misrepresenting these figures but they still give you a sense.

Square Enix - Q revenue - roughly 600 million
Activision Blizzard - 2 billion at least at one recent point (Admitedly 400 million of which was candy crush, but that is literally the top mobile game ever)
Microsoft studios - 3 billion _net income_ (gaap revenue I read was 20 billion)
Adobe 1.3 billion
EA - Gaap net revenue 4.3 billion, net income 900 million ish

One of the biggest mobile developers - gameloft. sales revenue 250 million EU ish.

As you can see, these are MILES away from each other. Gameloft doesn't do bad, but the overall profit from PC and console is many times higher.

The only ones who make money in mobile are top ten. Mostly the top five. Things like candy crush, and minecraft, gameloft, angry birds, temple run.

If there are lots of developers on mobile, its because they are small indie developers with a dream of getting rich. Like pub bands wanting to become rock stars. The dream of inventing the next angry birds - an easy to code program that is an addictive time waster.

PC and console is where the solid money is, because mobile users don't pay for software. It has much bigger overall profits, and developers get a greater distribution of share of those profits.

It's the more reliable way to make money, as a developer. Which is why, despite some mobile efforts, the big development companies all work primarily in console and PC.

 

[Drael646464]

inspite of having the large amount of money, inspite of paying them,,
ms couldn't manage to get developers support their wp platform, let alone paying a lot of developers!!!

MS hasn't paid for any mobile developers. They just got their inhouse team to write some apps for win8. They ARE developers.

This is wildly wrong.

 

[Drael646464]

I'm sorry to be like that, and you are a human being and I respect you, but you have got to stop saying things with such emphatic conviction when you clearly don't understand the subject matter well.

I can be disagreeable sometimes on issues I think I understand better than I do, we all do it.

But it just invites disagreement and arguments. Be a little more...idk, open, maybe?

 

[Guytronic]

Seeing some of ur invalid arguments, I have a bad feeling for u. u either don't wanna see Microsoft in the long run or u r just a google nerd.

What's invalid?

Apologies if you are frustrated by a realist who actually holds MSFT shares.
Microsoft must either find viability with the mobile effort at great expense or continue to fill the coffers with things that sell.

MS has been a long time player in the handheld market.
It was pushed to it's limit under Mr. Ballmer resulting in troubling decisions that proved expensive for the company.
Microsoft has absorbed losses after the Nokia buy out and has fortunately leveled things out for stockholders.

Mobile is a dangerous field for any company these days and Microsoft's leadership knows this which is why the downturn is happening.
Get angry if you must, yet it's just the way things are going.

 

[Drael646464]

The plan seems to be atm, so far as I can tell with all the "tells" and evidences around the andromeda device, to side step the mainstream mobile market for now, and try and create a niche. Andromeda appears to be ideal for dual screening and multi-tasking with its detachable dual screens, which if I had to guess, would be an enterprise focused product. Maybe it'll have cshell as well.

But the ability to very cleanly do two things at once - very much a productivity feature.

Despite everyones insistence to the contrary, they don't need to "win" the consumer market. They simply need to keep some dev going in the area, until current tech is made redundant. Like basically treading water. Andromeda could be a bit of an enabling tech too, for when the true folding graphene screens become affordable, much later down the track and open the power of desktop software to consumer uses.

Its a bit like how they have dealt with the tablet market. On a big screen, windows is the more powerful platform. but it falls down when its a small screen, or if it has to rely heavily on apps only. So they made the surface - which is a bit of both a PC and a tablet, and it works well. They haven't got a total marketshare, but hybrid windows tablets are rapidly growing, despite shrink everywhere else in tablets, and it gives msft a bit of a bridge to expand from with its roughly 5+ percent marketshare.

Windows on arm, is a similar 'bridge'. Enables always connected LTE, and some smaller shapes, encourages native UWP. Cshell, likewise - gives the OS smaller use shapes, and encourages scaling.

They are all like little steps, or little wedges.

That's all they really need in phones. Something with some users, of some kind, and a sliver of marketshare, while they build up UWP, and a little more rep, and work their way in.

I don't think many people are expecting MSFT to "run at it", and I don't think that'd be wise.

Rather having a bit of a patient attitude, and having little plays, like apple did back in the day, trying to piece their way in.

They do have plenty of diverse revenue streams unlike apple and google, and so its not as do or die as people sometimes make out. Microsoft studios alone is a pretty profitable beast.
And azure is doing very well. Lots of income streams, and they are under no immediate threat at all.

Important in the long run, mobile, little screens, for ecosystem use, branding, and the one OS vision, as well as a little future proofing in terms of the whole scalability idea - but yeah, not this weird "be mobile now or go extinct" mentality that many laypeople seem to think is happening in the marketplace.

 

[imsai0]

No, mobile is not where developers are. Most app makers for mobile platforms make pennies. People spend very little on mobile apps. The major development companies all develop for PC and console. The game industry, for example, on PC and console, makes more money than the movie industry.

Only the top ten app makers on mobile platforms get decent dollars. PC software can go for 100 plus dollars. People are reluctant to spend 4 bucks on a mobile app. If "mobile was where the developers are", EA, Microsoft studios, square enix, adobe and others would all stop writing for the more profitable PC console industry and start making exclusively mobile apps.

This is just completely wrong.

really?? ok. next

Square Enix - Q revenue - roughly 600 million
Activision Blizzard - 2 billion at least at one recent point (Admitedly 400 million of which was candy crush, but that is literally the top mobile game ever)
Microsoft studios - 3 billion _net income_ (gaap revenue I read was 20 billion)
Adobe 1.3 billion
EA - Gaap net revenue 4.3 billion, net income 900 million ish
One of the biggest mobile developers - gameloft. sales revenue 250 million EU ish.
As you can see, these are MILES away from each other. Gameloft doesn't do bad, but the overall profit from PC and console is many times higher

hm. good analysis. actually you did as much good as an economist. unfortunately , I have a short answer for that analysis. PCs are on the decline. most of the people nowadays depend on smartphones. they just need light computing. so decling pc sales means less people are buying pcs and spending time on it. Microsoft making money from hardware? this year surface revune has gone down 26%. history says Microsoft made its money from windows. Cloud & Xbox business may take them long. but how long? PCs may survive for the next 10 or 20 years? ( Apple has already sailed their Mac business. ) after then? where companies like Adobe or other PC software vendors will be?

MS hasn't paid for any mobile developers. They just got their inhouse team to write some apps for win8. They ARE developers.

This is wildly wrong.

Microsoft paid developers $100 for each app in 2013. but that didn't change their fortune. a quick wild google search should reveal more info.

I'm sorry to be like that, and you are a human being and I respect you, but you have got to stop saying things with such emphatic conviction when you clearly don't understand the subject matter well

thank you very much. you can't predict the future without observing current affairs. all the analogy you did , won't stand in the future. X company may earn $100000 dollars now
. but you have to think what will happen to the X company when they won't have the platform from where they earn!!

well. thank u again for all the hardwork & analysis.