Three's a crowd: Microsoft

Friday, February 11, 2011, Stephen Elop announces that Nokia will exclusively adopt Windows Phone as the system for its smartphones. Two and a half years later, Microsoft announces the purchase of Nokia's devices and services division and its Lumia family of smartphones. One would think that with those two announcements the possibility of seeing a Nokia smartphone running Android would be completely buried, but history is full of unexpected twists.

This Monday, February 24, 2014, Elop himself has presented three Nokia smartphones with Android operating systemThe same CEO and the same Nokia that three years before chose Windows Phone and that is about to close its sale to Microsoft now appears embracing the most direct competition from Redmond. How do you explain such a move and what does it mean for the future of Microsoft on mobile?

Nokia is still independent, Microsoft tries to look on the bright side

Stephen Elop already tried to make clear the intentions of the Finns with the Nokia X and others, but the opinion of those who will soon be its owners remained to be known. Frank X. Shaw, corporate vice president of communications at Microsoft, has tried to take care of that, and has published a note on the company's official blog clarifying a couple of points.

First of all Nokia's purchase is not finished yet The process should be finished by the end of next March but until then Microsoft and Nokia continue to operate as independent companiesAs Shaw explains, this is a regulatory requirement that will remain in place until the acquisition is complete.

Secondly, Shaw expresses the satisfaction of those in Redmond to see their services such as Skype, OneDrive and Outlook.com present in the Android devices introduced by Nokia. With them they hope to have the opportunity for Microsoft services to reach more millions of people, particularly in growth markets.

That being said, Shaw recalls that Microsoft's mobile strategy continues to revolve around Windows Phone and that's something we don't its going to change. More to go.

Nokia X comes from afar and could have motivated the acquisition

Apart from explanations on either side, the presence of Nokia's X family makes it convenient to review the newspaper library and rescue a rumor that appeared around the purchase of the company by Microsoft.According to him, Redmond rushed to take over Nokia when they found out that the manufacturer was experimenting with using Android in some of its future smartphones.

Nokia X could have been what set off alarm bells in Redmond and forced the purchase of Nokia.

The facts now seem to give veracity to that information. It is hard to imagine that Nokia would start designing a smartphone with Android once the agreement for its sale to Microsoft was closed. Most likely, the Nokia X was already an ongoing project that could have raised redmond alerts and forced the operation.

But the process takes time and Espoo have decided to make use of their temporary independence by keeping their Android smartphones afloat. Of course along the way they have been in charge of erasing all resemblance to Google's Android and filling it with all its services and direct connection to the Microsoft cloud.

Troy Horse?

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The latter is a key point. As much as Nokia X and family are making headlines about Nokia adopting Android> is an Android fork that tries to avoid any relationship with Google and its services at all costs."

Nokia has taken the open source version of Android (AOSP) without the entire layer of Google services and applications and turned it into its own version of the system. In a strategy similar to that of Amazon with its Kindle Fire, the Finnish company has created its own interface (very similar to that of Windows Phone) and resorted to its own applications and services to bring these smartphones to life.

So yes, Nokia has turned to Android, but they've done it without Google. And it has also done so by putting Microsoft in its place. Stephen Elop has made it clear during his conference at MWC: these smartphones are the gateway for millions of potential customers to the cloud and associated Microsoft services.

Nokia X's are the way to reach millions of new users by bypassing Mountain View and luring them to Redmond.

Nokia X, Nokia X+ and Nokia XL thus become the Trojan horse (yes, again Elop and the same analogy) of Nokia and Microsoft with respect to Google and their own vision of Android. These mobiles are the way to reach millions of new users bypassing Mountain View and attracting them to Redmond. They offer an access route for these users to Microsoft services, which they will be able to fully enjoy later with the purchase, this time, of a Windows Phone .

And now?

It is difficult to know what will happen when Microsoft finally completes the acquisition of Nokia Redmond may close this line of mobiles and Nokia X end up being remembered as one of the mobile phones that have lasted the least on the market.Or maybe not and let the months go by waiting to see the reaction of the market.

My humble impression, totally subjective, is that this range will not have continuity in the hands of Microsoft And it will not have it by pure logic. In Redmond they already have their own mobile system, which they have put a tremendous amount of effort into and it works well on all sorts of devices. They don't need Android even for the low-end, where Nokia itself has already shown how well it can hold its own.

Nokia X is late. So late that it probably won't last long. The Trojan horse strategy would have made sense for Nokia three years ago, but not now. For Microsoft I don't think it ever will.

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