Windows Phone Revival – 11 Step Plan

Microsoft should bring back Windows Phone! Here is a 11 step revival plan, to bring it back!

  1. Drop the Windows Phone name, and call it “Surface Phone”
  2. Use the Windows 11 kernel/system and Android sub-system, and port it onto phone hardware
  3. Quietly relaunch it on Microsoft’s website and into stores. No special events, only word of mouth (blogs, new websites, social media)
  4. Have the full set of Windows 11 applications (paint, file explorer), along with android apps.
  5. Use the Surface tablets, as the design template (obvious)
  6. Don’t advertise like in the past. Just advertise “Surface Phone”, the way Google does with the Pixel.
  7. Sell the Surface Phone, as a phone that transforms into a full PC, with mouse and keyboard support. Something more utilitarian than Android and iPhone.
  8. Price it competitively below most high end Android and iPhones.
  9. Only two models, a 128GB and 256GB with expandable storage
  10. Emulate the camera quality of the previous Luminas.
  11. Have full fledged Office Apps, that transform into desktop apps, when plugged into a monitor. This would be great selling point.

See the source image

Microsoft certainly has the resources, to relaunch Windows Phone again! Hopefully they will sometime in the future.

Conversation 14 comments

  • lvthunder

    Premium Member
    23 September, 2021 - 7:59 pm

    <p>They can’t price them below major Androids and iPhone and keep the same quality because they can’t buy the parts for the price Apple and Samsung do because they can’t buy as many, The more you buy the cheaper each one becomes.</p>

  • wunderbar

    Premium Member
    23 September, 2021 - 8:31 pm

    <p>The surface duo and surface duo 2 are the surface phones.</p><p><br></p><p>We’re not getting a smartphone running windows. That ship sailed a very, very long time ago.</p>

    • L Gilles

      23 September, 2021 - 8:45 pm

      <p><em>"That ship sailed a very, very long time ago."</em></p><p><br></p><p>You’re right, they tried and failed … loudly and painfully.</p><p>A new platform can’t succeed without apps.</p><p><br></p><p>I had Lumia 510 ou 520, nice device but it was a time I didn’t need too much from my phone.</p><p><br></p><p>I would prefer an adventurous Microsoft on the tablet market, something with Windows ARM and a stylus maybe ?</p>

    • hrlngrv

      Premium Member
      23 September, 2021 - 9:49 pm

      <p>Sailed, sank, insurance paid off, whatever crew survived the sinking were eaten by sharks or cannibals.</p><p><br></p><p>Windows as a phone OS is dead &amp; gone. Live tiles, which were the main UI differentiator vs Android and iOS are effectively deprecated in Windows 11. Whatever made Windows phones distinctive also made them abject market failures from the perspective of members of MSFT’s board of directors. They’re not coming back no matter how many times their fans request them.</p>

  • hrlngrv

    Premium Member
    23 September, 2021 - 9:45 pm

    <p>The umpteenth request for a Surface Phone.</p><p><br></p><p>You already have the Surface Duo. THAT’S IT. MSFT isn’t going to make other phones no matter how branded.</p><p><br></p><p>There are/have been Android phones which can be docked and transform into Linux desktops. They may be a lot less demand for such than you believe. As for <em>full-fledged Office apps</em>, you dream. If the OS were Android shifting to Linux when docked (which would be IMMENSELY EASIER than trying to run virtualized Windows under Android as host OS), there’d be a Linux version of Office. You live in a different universe if you believe that could become reality this decade. OTOH, virtualized Windows under Android just might require a considerable bit of time to get right, and it’d require a fair chunk of storage for the Android VM subsystem and Windows. Meaning a 128GB model might be rather an awful usage experience.</p><p><br></p><p>Priced below higher-end Android and iPhone handsets? You seriously believe the MSFT board of directors would OK such an investment? Presumably that’d be WITHOUT docking, docked desktop OS or desktop version of Office. Adding those features would be what, a minimum US$300 add-on?</p><p><br></p><p>There are no profits for MSFT to make by selling its own phones. I figure the Surface Duo exists as a way for MSFT to maintain a tactical toehold in the smartphone market which it may be able to exploit when <strong><em>AND ONLY IF</em></strong> Android and/or iOS suffer serious fiascos. At the moment, there’s no such opening, so other than Surface Duo there aren’t going to be any MSFT phones.</p>

  • rob_segal

    Premium Member
    24 September, 2021 - 12:42 am

    <p>There won’t be a Windows Phone revival, no matter what steps you can come up with. Microsoft has and will continue to have a very challenging time selling Android phones. Windows Phone would be an infinitely greater challenge.</p>

  • geoff

    24 September, 2021 - 12:48 am

    <p>This suggestion comes up so often that it seems that there are enough buyers out there for the idea to be successful.</p><p><br></p><p>Microsoft could do this easily, right now, if they wanted to. </p><p>Windows-11-on-ARM on Surface Duo hardware, running Android Apps from the Windows 11 App store . . . </p><p><br></p><p>Just take my money, Microsoft.</p>

    • hrlngrv

      Premium Member
      24 September, 2021 - 1:30 pm

      <p>The Year of Windows Phone’s Revival will be the year after the Year of Desktop Linux.</p><p><br></p><p>Wishful thinking is all around us.</p>

      • spacein_vader

        Premium Member
        27 September, 2021 - 2:55 am

        <p>This. As Elsa said, let it go. </p>

  • navarac

    24 September, 2021 - 3:17 am

    <p>It’s a shame, but never going to happen, end of….</p>

  • anoldamigauser

    Premium Member
    24 September, 2021 - 12:20 pm

    <p>It is all about the apps. Developers are simply not going to support Windows Phone now, since they did not support it before. I suppose if WoA supported Android Apps and it wasn’t limited to the Amazon Store they could do that, but otherwise it will just not have the apps you need.</p><p>Personally, I would be happy with a Duo running WoA to use as an electronic moleskin/ultraportable computer and a phone to run the apps I need while moving about.</p>

  • jimchamplin

    Premium Member
    24 September, 2021 - 1:11 pm

    <p>I think I have like six or seven old Windows Phones in a box somewhere. They all work. The only one that isn’t put away is my Lumia 820. I have it on display with my vintage Macs, OG iPad, Commodore 128, and Atari 800.</p><p><br></p><p>Most of them were wholly unremarkable phones truthfully, with only their software setting them apart. The sad truth of the matter is though that Microsoft acted like Microsoft of the time and kept mashing the reset button. Windows Phone 7 to 8, no common dev platform between Windows 8 and Phone 8. 10 Mobile at all.</p><p><br></p><p>It was exciting for a while, but by the end it was quite tiring. I have more love for 80s 8-bits and Mac OS 9 at this point.</p>

  • bschnatt

    26 September, 2021 - 6:14 pm

    <p>Simply put, there wouldn’t be enough of a return on their investment. As much as it pains me to admit this (I still own and occasionally use my Lumia 950 XL), the Duo phones are the way to go. No emulators to futz with. They have the apps (including Microsoft ones) and Microsoft can spend their engineering time differentiating it enough to sell a few. A new Windows phone no longer makes sense and would be throwing money into a pit in the ground…</p>

  • boots

    28 September, 2021 - 11:34 pm

    <p>Step 12. Invest in the development of a time machine. Travel back to 2006 and release Windows phone before Apple release the iPhone.</p>

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