14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft is currently in the middle of its mobile revival, with the company launching new flagship devices and getting ready to introduce a new operating system supposed to breathe life into a strategy that would in the end make it a better rival to Android and iOS.
While Lumia 950 and 950 XL flagships are now launching across the world, the company is slowly moving to the budget market, where the focus doesn’t seem to be as big as in the high-end.
As far as India is concerned, the company’s flagships running Windows 10 Mobile will indeed become available to local buyers, but given the country’s appetite for more affordable devices, everyone’s wondering when exactly the company is planning to release low-end models there.
Not soon, that’s for sure, as a company executive has said in an interview that Microsoft is closely analyzing every step it takes in the mobile industry, and low-cost devices aren’t on the radar right now for India.
“We are sort of re-building so we will start high. New generation smartphones first and then you will see a scale overtime,” Steve “Guggs” Guggenheimer, the chief evangelist at Microsoft Corporation, is quoted as saying. “I do not have a timeline for new range phones as of now. One step at a time and you can assume it to be logical for us to scale the Lumia line to other price points over time.”
New mobile strategy
The company has recently unveiled the Lumia 550, a very affordable Windows 10 Mobile device that will soon debut in several markets. India, however, doesn’t seem to be one of these markets, according to Guggenheimer’s statement.
Low-end devices are seen as the fastest way to gain market share, and that’s exactly what Microsoft needs right now, as Windows Phone is only powering less than 3 percent of the smartphones across the world.
But with the arrival of Windows 10 Mobile, Microsoft’s changing gears and is no longer aiming for market share. The company’s new strategy is said to include only six smartphone models, two in each of the following categories: low-end, mid-range, and flagships. It remains to be seen how fast Microsoft moves to unveil the remaining models, but judging from Guggenheimer’s remarks, it could take a while until the full lineup sees daylight.