Quite often, IT companies surprise us with their decisions. Most recently, Apple amazed all of us with its iOS 8 upcoming features. Before that, Nokia (which is now NokiabyMicrosoft) left us in many thoughts when it announced Nokia X series, running on forked Android platform. There were questions, straightaway, by the critics regarding the launch. Even, we were not able to understand the logic behind this. Now, it seems Microsoft has admitted it a ‘miscued’ plan and has decided to kill Nokia X series!
This is leaked by an internal memo of Microsoft. The memo claims that Microsoft has put Nokia X development along with Asha and Series 40 in ‘maintenance mode’, means no more in development. Gradually, Microsoft will kill Nokia X series, Asha phones and Series 40 during 18 months period. Microsoft will replace these handsets with low, mid and high-end Windows Phones.
Nokia X series was launched five months ago at MWC 2014. The company introduced three handsets in the series i.e. Nokia X, Nokia X+ and Nokia XL. Later on, in June, Nokia X2 was also added. The introduction was made during the partnership talks between Nokia and Microsoft. As per Asha and Series 40, both are Nokia’s featured phones for small markets. They will also be ended next year.
The announcement to kill Nokia X series has already affected the sales of the handsets. Surely, this will result in minimizing the prices of Nokia X series too. Moreover, there are also some words regarding Nokia MixRadio service. The service is also now no more in development. Microsoft plans to sell this service to a third party.
Microsoft is takings some big decision to increase its Windows Phone OS popularity. The firm is already in talks with other OEMs to introduce high-end Windows Phones in the market. But well, one thing that I have noted, Microsoft is too slow in updating its Windows Phone platform. WP 8.1 has not been rolled out completely yet. It’s time for Microsoft to speed up its WP updates and equip Windows Phone platform with all the main features.