Microsoft recently sold Nokia to HMD Global, a Finnish company, as part of their restructure given that their mobile department has been failing in recent years. However, a report from The Register reveals that the company is not letting go of Windows 10 Mobile and their rumored upcoming phone, dubbed the Surface Phone.
According to the report, Corporate Vice President Kevin Gallo recently spoke to a crowd in London during the Build Tour in which he explained that Microsoft is not abandoning the direction of Windows 10 Phone and that consumers can still look forward to a new product.
"We're really aligned to what we've done on the Windows desktop," he explained, "which is we'll lead with some high-end and category innovation like we've done with Surface, and OEMs will go and build the breadth of the catalog."
Gallo also revealed that they are shifting away from designing affordable smart-phones as this strategy was done by Nokia and this obviously did not work well for them. Instead, the company will now be directing their smartphones, which include the upcoming Microsoft Surface Phone, toward the high-end enterprise market.
The VP further stated that the business sector has always been the core strength of Microsoft and will be their primary target moving forward with Windows 10 mobile phones. This will mean their phones will be more expensive and designed for work instead of casual app use.
Despite this, the report points out that users owning the Surface Phone will have all the tools they need if the phone comes with efficient start-up apps, an area that recent Windows 10 phones lacked in. There is also the fact that the Surface Phone is being designed with the Universal Windows Platform (UWP), which will make it easier to integrate PC apps and software into the mobile version.
According to Ecumenical News, no official release date has yet been announced but the phone is likely to launch by March 2017.
