That's in Scotland (shortest life span in the UK).
For its part, Nokia maintains that the level of preorders in the U.K. "has been higher for Lumia than any previous handset."
Of other Nokia handsets perhaps but no way ANY other handset.
Nokia dropped the ball years ago by not being inventive, releasing too many products and not supporting them after release (sounds like most Android phones).
Yeah, it's not saying much as their marketshare here is even less than that of WP7, which at most is 2%, but thought to be between 1-1.5%.
Ballmer (and a lot of Apple fans) just will never get it.
Apple doesn't care if it's the biggest. It's nice, but as long as they make the best products they can, and are profitable (apparently to the envy of others), who cares if the product is #1 or 20?
By the time Nokia and MS get something halfway decent out the door the iPhone 5 will be on sale. They're about three years too late to this party.
Doomed.
Nokia is the next RIM.
Just curious as to why you place so much value on the iPhone 5? Do you really expect something new and radical? I expect LTE compatibility and a new physical look and feel. That's about it. I expect pretty much the exact same interface. There's far too many people invested in the current interface to make any radical changes. So personally, I don't really see a huge jump from 4S to 5.
Microsoft on the other hand has attempted to present something that *is* new and radical. The user interface is unlike anything Apple is doing. This is both a good and bad thing of course, depending on your preferences. If I were a social person, with FaceBook and Twitter being a priority in my life, I'd really like to give Windows Phone a try. I'm impressed with the way they've integrated those two services into the user interface. Not just separate apps, but integrated centrally with your contacts. It's people oriented, rather than app oriented. I find that interesting. I'm not willing to dismiss WP7 out of hand as so many do. Too many see the word Microsoft and just want to write it off.
Sorry, but various studies have shown that cheap phones are like cheap computers, either they lose money, or at best, break even. The problem that Nokia has is that local companies in China and even India now, are moving in on their cheap phone business and taking business from that. Apple and various Android vendors are taking the profitable high end smartphone business away, and that gives them problems. If you look at their financials, you will see many problems.
Do you know that Nokia makes over 200 different phones? Most sell in relatively small numbers.
They are firing large numbers of people, closing factories, shutting down internal software development; all bad news.
Twenty years ago, Motorola seemed unassailable. They were one of the biggest, most advanced technology companies, and for years, the biggest cell phone manufacturer. But look what happened to them since.
Nokia is on that track. Even Nokia Siemens, their industrial networking manufacturing arm is in big trouble. This is a company in serious decline.
Remember, just a few years ago they had 60% of the worlds smartphone market, but now it's below 17%, and shrinking. This is where they make their profits, or used to, as they aren't making a profit now.
Yes, think of Alcatel Lucent, who also was at one time an actor on this market, with what seemed to be at that time an undisputed expertise in telecom ...
The Nokia cloner Windows Phone is DOA just like I predicted. No sales numbers means only one thing...it is not selling. Why would a Nokia cloner Windows Phone magically sell when no other cloner Windows Phones are selling? Because the OS is garbage, that is why. The UI is terrible and totally unusable.
"Totally unusable"? Seriously? You're one of those either/or people, aren't you? Something is either the greatest thing since sliced bread, or it sucks. No other possibility.
The Windows Phone UI feels alive. In comparison other phones feel like you are prodding a dead zombie corpse to do your bidding. HTC Sense and some other Android skins are a little different, they are more like prodding a zombie corpse dressed for the mardi gras.
It's hard to find words to explain the Windows Phone UI unless you've played with it, but "real and natural" is a pretty good attempt.
Unfortunately for Microsoft "it feels alive" isn't a field on a check list of features people look for when purchasing a smartphone, it doesn't translate well in video or print and no-one owns a Windows Phone for other people to have hands on experience with.
I have tried the new Tiles interface - although in a VM on a Mac - perhaps the experience is entirely different on a touch screen device - but on a computer it doesn't impress me.
[...] ?With no breakthrough innovation, we believe Nokia?s new phones are unlikely to get traction in a highly concentrated high end,? he said, adding that the Lumia smartphones are not competitive on price or performance. [...]
Sounds like Nokia is already descending to the next level of doom.
Level 0: Nokia ignored iPhone's impact, tried to coast on their name recognition.
Level 1: Nokia rapidly transitioned from market leader to massive loser.
Level 2: Nokia replaced old CEO with ex-Microsoft exec, then cut a deal with Microsoft.
Level 3: Nokia's new phones struggle against other WP7 phones for that 1.5% WP7 market share.
Level 4: ???
How much longer can Microsoft and Nokia shovel money into the dumpster fire they've created?
I think many people under-estimate Microsoft, especially in the Enterprise. IT Managers looking for alternatives to RIM will look seriously at WP7 for several reasons:
- It's running a Microsoft OS just like the majority of PC's in their company.
- They can cost-effectively deploy, manage, and secure it.
- It's integrates easily with Exchange which most corporations run.
Microsoft will not become as dominant in smartphones as they are in PC's and Servers, as Apple grows and RIM tries to hang on. Android poses the biggest challenge to corporate IT departments, in my opinion, as it proliferates too many versions and has too many security holes. Plus, Google's whole business model for Android is based on mobile advertising which is the LAST thing corporate IT departments want!
My prediction is that in the Enterprise it's a 3 way race between Apple, RIM, and MS while in the Consumer space it's Google, Apple, and MS. Apple is in a strong position, especially in the Enterprise, but do NOT discount Microsoft.
It is still way too early to make predictions. Google Android is just beginning to get nailed on IP from Micrsoft, Oracle, and Apple, there is enormous risk for hardware vendors on Google platform. Some are getting MS insurance with a deal to sell their phones with windows. Nokia has a huge presence and if it leverages windows on its low end it can disrupt the market and work it's way up to higher end. MS has huge credibility in the Enterprise so tying Nkia Windows to MSExchange, SharePoint, and Office will have huge leverage especially with phone management and security. The Enterprise mindlessly does MS so this is a great lever for Nokia.
In reality there is a lot of true innovation in the MS UI versus Android's pcopying Apple and will introduce new options to users, especially when integrated with desktop and thei tablet. While they have a lot of legacy baggage the foundations are slowly emerging.
Nokia's big problem is not selling MS phones but rather making profit. Like PCs the real money will be on the OS, ecosystem, and underlying technology (like INTEL with PCs) not diving to the low price low profit space PC makers struggle.
My bet is they will start slow but build momentum as Google Android get IP nailed, Enterprise piles on, and low end Nokia Windows devices expand.
Regarding the US, their biggest problem is brand recognition, they will prob be known as MS Windows phone company whose name no one can remember.
Nokia has chosen to bet the company to be a commodity hardware vendor for MS - not a good place to be.
I have tried the new Tiles interface - although in a VM on a Mac - perhaps the experience is entirely different on a touch screen device - but on a computer it doesn't impress me.
I gotta admit, the Start screen on both Windows Phone and Windows 8 is the least impressive part of each. On the phone, big monochrome tiles with low-contrast text. Hard to read. They can dynamically update themselves, which is interesting; so perhaps functional, but not aesthetically pleasing. On Windows 8 it's worse. With too much color and a chaotic jumbling of tiles. It's like they're deliberately making it confusing. The Metro interface is much more interesting once you get past the Start screen.
Please explain what you mean, why was Nokia not "inventive"
They were pretty inventive. They caused nation wide famine in the south of Great Britian (nobody cares about southern Brits though) and single handedly collapsed the world market in Fall of 2008.
WP7 can follow the route that android phones used on the way to greatness that is buy one get one free or a free phone with a two year contract. This route never fails just look at how well android phones are doing now.
What is sacrificing profits for a company like MS with tons of cash to back them up.
As my girlfriend (who represents the average consumer) said so wonderfully about the HTC Titan, "It doesn't feel like a phone or computer, it feels real and natural."
Just curious as to why you place so much value on the iPhone 5? Do you really expect something new and radical? I expect LTE compatibility and a new physical look and feel. That's about it. I expect pretty much the exact same interface. There's far too many people invested in the current interface to make any radical changes. So personally, I don't really see a huge jump from 4S to 5.
Microsoft on the other hand has attempted to present something that *is* new and radical. The user interface is unlike anything Apple is doing. This is both a good and bad thing of course, depending on your preferences. If I were a social person, with FaceBook and Twitter being a priority in my life, I'd really like to give Windows Phone a try. I'm impressed with the way they've integrated those two services into the user interface. Not just separate apps, but integrated centrally with your contacts. It's people oriented, rather than app oriented. I find that interesting. I'm not willing to dismiss WP7 out of hand as so many do. Too many see the word Microsoft and just want to write it off.
While I think that overall, WP7 is fine, there are problems with the interface in the way MS implemented it. At least for now, you've got to scroll through all the tiles to find the one you're looking for until you get to it. There is no fast way to get to an arbitrary place in a list, and so on. These get tiring after a while if you have a lot of tiles or a long list, such as your contacts.
It's also been criticized for wasting a lot of space. There are just a very few things on one screen at a time, which makes it necessary to constantly scroll back and forth.
So, sure, it's different. But different isn't always better, often, it's just different, and there's nothing great about being different.
Why is this so unpopular? Perhaps people don't like this tile UI. The vast majority of people are buying Android and iOS phones, and Android looks enough like iOS so that we can say that it seems to be the preferred UI. If this is a big reason why the phones are such a failure so far, then that's a major problem for Ms and its OEM's, because there's no fix for it. It's the entire reason why WP 7 (and now Metro) exists as it does. It's their main selling point.
Please explain what you mean, why was Nokia not "inventive"
Because they stuck with Symbian long after they were told it wasn't able to keep up. And they must have known that. Reviews of their smartphones would tell a nice story about the hardware, often enough, but then mention the problems with the OS. Jerky operation, things buried too far down. Too many clicks. Non responsive UI, etc. all signs of an obsolete OS that is being pushed far beyond what it was capable of doing.
Nokia wasn't capable enough itself to see that. At least, not at the highest levels, where as late as six months before he was received of duty, Ollie called the iPhone a "boutique phone", and dismissed Android altogether.
This is a company that was not only incapable of invention, but was clueless, and lacked the ability to innovate (likely the word he meant, as you were probing to find out).
Now, they are reaping what they sowed. Which is not much.
I think many people under-estimate Microsoft, especially in the Enterprise. IT Managers looking for alternatives to RIM will look seriously at WP7 for several reasons:
- It's running a Microsoft OS just like the majority of PC's in their company.
- They can cost-effectively deploy, manage, and secure it.
- It's integrates easily with Exchange which most corporations run.
Microsoft will not become as dominant in smartphones as they are in PC's and Servers, as Apple grows and RIM tries to hang on. Android poses the biggest challenge to corporate IT departments, in my opinion, as it proliferates too many versions and has too many security holes. Plus, Google's whole business model for Android is based on mobile advertising which is the LAST thing corporate IT departments want!
My prediction is that in the Enterprise it's a 3 way race between Apple, RIM, and MS while in the Consumer space it's Google, Apple, and MS. Apple is in a strong position, especially in the Enterprise, but do NOT discount Microsoft.
1. This is not Windows, so it doesn't matter.
2. Its no more cost effective than any other major phone OS.
3. The iPhone integrates with Exchange easier than does WP7, which is a criticism of it.
4. It's the least security enabled of the major platforms.
WP 7, if it's in any race at all right now, is in a race to stay at the bottom. Even Ballmer has stated that sales went from "Very small to very small". The highest estimates give it a 2% marketshare in smartphones. Most say it's between 1-2%.
It is still way too early to make predictions. Google Android is just beginning to get nailed on IP from Micrsoft, Oracle, and Apple, there is enormous risk for hardware vendors on Google platform. Some are getting MS insurance with a deal to sell their phones with windows. Nokia has a huge presence and if it leverages windows on its low end it can disrupt the market and work it's way up to higher end. MS has huge credibility in the Enterprise so tying Nkia Windows to MSExchange, SharePoint, and Office will have huge leverage especially with phone management and security. The Enterprise mindlessly does MS so this is a great lever for Nokia.
In reality there is a lot of true innovation in the MS UI versus Android's pcopying Apple and will introduce new options to users, especially when integrated with desktop and thei tablet. While they have a lot of legacy baggage the foundations are slowly emerging.
Nokia's big problem is not selling MS phones but rather making profit. Like PCs the real money will be on the OS, ecosystem, and underlying technology (like INTEL with PCs) not diving to the low price low profit space PC makers struggle.
My bet is they will start slow but build momentum as Google Android get IP nailed, Enterprise piles on, and low end Nokia Windows devices expand.
Regarding the US, their biggest problem is brand recognition, they will prob be known as MS Windows phone company whose name no one can remember.
Nokia has chosen to bet the company to be a commodity hardware vendor for MS - not a good place to be.
Nokia has little brand recognition here in the US, it's true, but MS certainly doesn't. If Samsung and HTc can't sell WP 7 phones here, what makes anyone think that Nokia can? It makes no sense, and is really stretching.
Microsoft on the other hand has attempted to present something that *is* new and radical.
Yes. New, radical and crap. Being different doesn't attract customers. Being better does. Microsoft's idiotic tile-based interface is a waste of precious screen real estate. It isn't better, it's more confusing and more time consuming. Fail. And the sales numbers prove it.
But hey, hats off to Microsoft for not simply ripping-off a competitor for a change. That's new and radical. Pity they're so poor at innovating, and so slow about it, too.
Comments
For its part, Nokia maintains that the level of preorders in the U.K. "has been higher for Lumia than any previous handset."
Of other Nokia handsets perhaps but no way ANY other handset.
Nokia dropped the ball years ago by not being inventive, releasing too many products and not supporting them after release (sounds like most Android phones).
Yeah, it's not saying much as their marketshare here is even less than that of WP7, which at most is 2%, but thought to be between 1-1.5%.
Apple doesn't care if it's the biggest. It's nice, but as long as they make the best products they can, and are profitable (apparently to the envy of others), who cares if the product is #1 or 20?
The Windows Phone UI feels alive.
If by "feels alive" you mean, "feels like sticking your finger in a pool of maggots", then yes, I'd agree with you.
Stick a fork in this thing - it's already done.
By the time Nokia and MS get something halfway decent out the door the iPhone 5 will be on sale. They're about three years too late to this party.
Doomed.
Nokia is the next RIM.
Just curious as to why you place so much value on the iPhone 5? Do you really expect something new and radical? I expect LTE compatibility and a new physical look and feel. That's about it. I expect pretty much the exact same interface. There's far too many people invested in the current interface to make any radical changes. So personally, I don't really see a huge jump from 4S to 5.
Microsoft on the other hand has attempted to present something that *is* new and radical. The user interface is unlike anything Apple is doing. This is both a good and bad thing of course, depending on your preferences. If I were a social person, with FaceBook and Twitter being a priority in my life, I'd really like to give Windows Phone a try. I'm impressed with the way they've integrated those two services into the user interface. Not just separate apps, but integrated centrally with your contacts. It's people oriented, rather than app oriented. I find that interesting. I'm not willing to dismiss WP7 out of hand as so many do. Too many see the word Microsoft and just want to write it off.
Sorry, but various studies have shown that cheap phones are like cheap computers, either they lose money, or at best, break even. The problem that Nokia has is that local companies in China and even India now, are moving in on their cheap phone business and taking business from that. Apple and various Android vendors are taking the profitable high end smartphone business away, and that gives them problems. If you look at their financials, you will see many problems.
Do you know that Nokia makes over 200 different phones? Most sell in relatively small numbers.
They are firing large numbers of people, closing factories, shutting down internal software development; all bad news.
Twenty years ago, Motorola seemed unassailable. They were one of the biggest, most advanced technology companies, and for years, the biggest cell phone manufacturer. But look what happened to them since.
Nokia is on that track. Even Nokia Siemens, their industrial networking manufacturing arm is in big trouble. This is a company in serious decline.
Remember, just a few years ago they had 60% of the worlds smartphone market, but now it's below 17%, and shrinking. This is where they make their profits, or used to, as they aren't making a profit now.
Yes, think of Alcatel Lucent, who also was at one time an actor on this market, with what seemed to be at that time an undisputed expertise in telecom ...
The Nokia cloner Windows Phone is DOA just like I predicted. No sales numbers means only one thing...it is not selling. Why would a Nokia cloner Windows Phone magically sell when no other cloner Windows Phones are selling? Because the OS is garbage, that is why. The UI is terrible and totally unusable.
"Totally unusable"? Seriously? You're one of those either/or people, aren't you? Something is either the greatest thing since sliced bread, or it sucks. No other possibility.
The Windows Phone UI feels alive. In comparison other phones feel like you are prodding a dead zombie corpse to do your bidding. HTC Sense and some other Android skins are a little different, they are more like prodding a zombie corpse dressed for the mardi gras.
It's hard to find words to explain the Windows Phone UI unless you've played with it, but "real and natural" is a pretty good attempt.
Unfortunately for Microsoft "it feels alive" isn't a field on a check list of features people look for when purchasing a smartphone, it doesn't translate well in video or print and no-one owns a Windows Phone for other people to have hands on experience with.
I have tried the new Tiles interface - although in a VM on a Mac - perhaps the experience is entirely different on a touch screen device - but on a computer it doesn't impress me.
[...] ?With no breakthrough innovation, we believe Nokia?s new phones are unlikely to get traction in a highly concentrated high end,? he said, adding that the Lumia smartphones are not competitive on price or performance. [...]
Sounds like Nokia is already descending to the next level of doom.
Level 0: Nokia ignored iPhone's impact, tried to coast on their name recognition.
Level 1: Nokia rapidly transitioned from market leader to massive loser.
Level 2: Nokia replaced old CEO with ex-Microsoft exec, then cut a deal with Microsoft.
Level 3: Nokia's new phones struggle against other WP7 phones for that 1.5% WP7 market share.
Level 4: ???
How much longer can Microsoft and Nokia shovel money into the dumpster fire they've created?
Nokia dropped the ball years ago by not being inventive,
Please explain what you mean, why was Nokia not "inventive"
- It's running a Microsoft OS just like the majority of PC's in their company.
- They can cost-effectively deploy, manage, and secure it.
- It's integrates easily with Exchange which most corporations run.
Microsoft will not become as dominant in smartphones as they are in PC's and Servers, as Apple grows and RIM tries to hang on. Android poses the biggest challenge to corporate IT departments, in my opinion, as it proliferates too many versions and has too many security holes. Plus, Google's whole business model for Android is based on mobile advertising which is the LAST thing corporate IT departments want!
My prediction is that in the Enterprise it's a 3 way race between Apple, RIM, and MS while in the Consumer space it's Google, Apple, and MS. Apple is in a strong position, especially in the Enterprise, but do NOT discount Microsoft.
In reality there is a lot of true innovation in the MS UI versus Android's pcopying Apple and will introduce new options to users, especially when integrated with desktop and thei tablet. While they have a lot of legacy baggage the foundations are slowly emerging.
Nokia's big problem is not selling MS phones but rather making profit. Like PCs the real money will be on the OS, ecosystem, and underlying technology (like INTEL with PCs) not diving to the low price low profit space PC makers struggle.
My bet is they will start slow but build momentum as Google Android get IP nailed, Enterprise piles on, and low end Nokia Windows devices expand.
Regarding the US, their biggest problem is brand recognition, they will prob be known as MS Windows phone company whose name no one can remember.
Nokia has chosen to bet the company to be a commodity hardware vendor for MS - not a good place to be.
I have tried the new Tiles interface - although in a VM on a Mac - perhaps the experience is entirely different on a touch screen device - but on a computer it doesn't impress me.
I gotta admit, the Start screen on both Windows Phone and Windows 8 is the least impressive part of each. On the phone, big monochrome tiles with low-contrast text. Hard to read. They can dynamically update themselves, which is interesting; so perhaps functional, but not aesthetically pleasing. On Windows 8 it's worse. With too much color and a chaotic jumbling of tiles. It's like they're deliberately making it confusing. The Metro interface is much more interesting once you get past the Start screen.
Please explain what you mean, why was Nokia not "inventive"
They were pretty inventive. They caused nation wide famine in the south of Great Britian (nobody cares about southern Brits though) and single handedly collapsed the world market in Fall of 2008.
Oh, they have not sold one phone since 2008.
This post is a lie.
What is sacrificing profits for a company like MS with tons of cash to back them up.
As my girlfriend (who represents the average consumer) said so wonderfully about the HTC Titan, "It doesn't feel like a phone or computer, it feels real and natural."
Did she mean the phone?
Just curious as to why you place so much value on the iPhone 5? Do you really expect something new and radical? I expect LTE compatibility and a new physical look and feel. That's about it. I expect pretty much the exact same interface. There's far too many people invested in the current interface to make any radical changes. So personally, I don't really see a huge jump from 4S to 5.
Microsoft on the other hand has attempted to present something that *is* new and radical. The user interface is unlike anything Apple is doing. This is both a good and bad thing of course, depending on your preferences. If I were a social person, with FaceBook and Twitter being a priority in my life, I'd really like to give Windows Phone a try. I'm impressed with the way they've integrated those two services into the user interface. Not just separate apps, but integrated centrally with your contacts. It's people oriented, rather than app oriented. I find that interesting. I'm not willing to dismiss WP7 out of hand as so many do. Too many see the word Microsoft and just want to write it off.
While I think that overall, WP7 is fine, there are problems with the interface in the way MS implemented it. At least for now, you've got to scroll through all the tiles to find the one you're looking for until you get to it. There is no fast way to get to an arbitrary place in a list, and so on. These get tiring after a while if you have a lot of tiles or a long list, such as your contacts.
It's also been criticized for wasting a lot of space. There are just a very few things on one screen at a time, which makes it necessary to constantly scroll back and forth.
So, sure, it's different. But different isn't always better, often, it's just different, and there's nothing great about being different.
Why is this so unpopular? Perhaps people don't like this tile UI. The vast majority of people are buying Android and iOS phones, and Android looks enough like iOS so that we can say that it seems to be the preferred UI. If this is a big reason why the phones are such a failure so far, then that's a major problem for Ms and its OEM's, because there's no fix for it. It's the entire reason why WP 7 (and now Metro) exists as it does. It's their main selling point.
Please explain what you mean, why was Nokia not "inventive"
Because they stuck with Symbian long after they were told it wasn't able to keep up. And they must have known that. Reviews of their smartphones would tell a nice story about the hardware, often enough, but then mention the problems with the OS. Jerky operation, things buried too far down. Too many clicks. Non responsive UI, etc. all signs of an obsolete OS that is being pushed far beyond what it was capable of doing.
Nokia wasn't capable enough itself to see that. At least, not at the highest levels, where as late as six months before he was received of duty, Ollie called the iPhone a "boutique phone", and dismissed Android altogether.
This is a company that was not only incapable of invention, but was clueless, and lacked the ability to innovate (likely the word he meant, as you were probing to find out).
Now, they are reaping what they sowed. Which is not much.
I think many people under-estimate Microsoft, especially in the Enterprise. IT Managers looking for alternatives to RIM will look seriously at WP7 for several reasons:
- It's running a Microsoft OS just like the majority of PC's in their company.
- They can cost-effectively deploy, manage, and secure it.
- It's integrates easily with Exchange which most corporations run.
Microsoft will not become as dominant in smartphones as they are in PC's and Servers, as Apple grows and RIM tries to hang on. Android poses the biggest challenge to corporate IT departments, in my opinion, as it proliferates too many versions and has too many security holes. Plus, Google's whole business model for Android is based on mobile advertising which is the LAST thing corporate IT departments want!
My prediction is that in the Enterprise it's a 3 way race between Apple, RIM, and MS while in the Consumer space it's Google, Apple, and MS. Apple is in a strong position, especially in the Enterprise, but do NOT discount Microsoft.
1. This is not Windows, so it doesn't matter.
2. Its no more cost effective than any other major phone OS.
3. The iPhone integrates with Exchange easier than does WP7, which is a criticism of it.
4. It's the least security enabled of the major platforms.
WP 7, if it's in any race at all right now, is in a race to stay at the bottom. Even Ballmer has stated that sales went from "Very small to very small". The highest estimates give it a 2% marketshare in smartphones. Most say it's between 1-2%.
It is still way too early to make predictions. Google Android is just beginning to get nailed on IP from Micrsoft, Oracle, and Apple, there is enormous risk for hardware vendors on Google platform. Some are getting MS insurance with a deal to sell their phones with windows. Nokia has a huge presence and if it leverages windows on its low end it can disrupt the market and work it's way up to higher end. MS has huge credibility in the Enterprise so tying Nkia Windows to MSExchange, SharePoint, and Office will have huge leverage especially with phone management and security. The Enterprise mindlessly does MS so this is a great lever for Nokia.
In reality there is a lot of true innovation in the MS UI versus Android's pcopying Apple and will introduce new options to users, especially when integrated with desktop and thei tablet. While they have a lot of legacy baggage the foundations are slowly emerging.
Nokia's big problem is not selling MS phones but rather making profit. Like PCs the real money will be on the OS, ecosystem, and underlying technology (like INTEL with PCs) not diving to the low price low profit space PC makers struggle.
My bet is they will start slow but build momentum as Google Android get IP nailed, Enterprise piles on, and low end Nokia Windows devices expand.
Regarding the US, their biggest problem is brand recognition, they will prob be known as MS Windows phone company whose name no one can remember.
Nokia has chosen to bet the company to be a commodity hardware vendor for MS - not a good place to be.
Nokia has little brand recognition here in the US, it's true, but MS certainly doesn't. If Samsung and HTc can't sell WP 7 phones here, what makes anyone think that Nokia can? It makes no sense, and is really stretching.
Microsoft on the other hand has attempted to present something that *is* new and radical.
Yes. New, radical and crap. Being different doesn't attract customers. Being better does. Microsoft's idiotic tile-based interface is a waste of precious screen real estate. It isn't better, it's more confusing and more time consuming. Fail. And the sales numbers prove it.
But hey, hats off to Microsoft for not simply ripping-off a competitor for a change. That's new and radical. Pity they're so poor at innovating, and so slow about it, too.