Microsoft cofounder gives mea culpa in recent interview

Jun 24, 2019 05:34 GMT  ·  By

The story of Windows Phone is about to come to an end, as Microsoft will retire the last version in December, leaving users with pretty much no other option that to finally make the move to Android or iPhone.

In fact, switching to one of these two platforms has been the only way to go for a long time, mostly because Android and iOS are the only operating systems boasting a large app ecosystem and benefiting from full developer support.

In a recent interview at an event hosted by venture firm Village Global, Microsoft founder Bill Gates said that things didn’t go exactly as planned in the mobile business mostly because of what he describes as “mismanagement,” pointing out that Windows Phone could have been bigger than Android if the right decisions were made at the right time.

“You know, in the software world, in particular for platforms, these are winner-take-all markets. So, you know, the greatest mistake ever is the whatever mismanagement I engaged in that caused Microsoft not to be what Android is, [meaning] Android is the standard non-Apple phone form platform. That was a natural thing for Microsoft to win,” Gates said as per TC.

“It really is winner take all. If you’re there with half as many apps or 90% as many apps, you’re on your way to complete doom. There’s room for exactly one non-Apple operating system, and what’s that worth? $400 billion that would be transferred from company G [Google] to company M [Microsoft].”

Last months of support for Windows 10 Mobile

Gates goes on to emphasize that some products are still strong these days, suggesting that it was the early decisions that made them solid offerings in the long term. Windows and Office are two of them, he said, but Gates admits that Windows Phone could have made Microsoft the absolute leader in software on all platforms.

“It’s amazing to me, having made one of the greatest mistakes of all time — and there was this antitrust lawsuit and various things that, you know, our other assets, Windows, Office, are still very strong. So we are a leading company. If we got that one right, we would be the company. But oh well,” Gates noted.

“So this idea that just small differences can magnify themselves doesn’t exist for a lot of businesses. You know, if you’re a service business, it doesn’t exist. But for software platforms, it’s absolutely gigantic. And so that’s partly where you have the mentality of every night you think, ‘Am I screwing this up?’ And eventually, we did screw up a super important one,” he continued.

Needless to say, despite the end-of-support date set for December, Windows Phone is already a doomed platform. With 0 percent market share, only the most hardcore users stick with its during these last few months, despite even Microsoft recommending everyone to switch to Android or iOS.