Dear Windows Phone OEMs, Learn from Nokia how to make your devices exclusive

Undoubtedly, Windows Phone is making its presence in the market, not just because of the User Interface but also because it is a remarkably stable phone. No matter which Windows Phone you buy, the experience is always the same. However, it seems that OEMs still cannot get it right, and they want to have more power over the customization aspect even though they already have experience in what happens when an OS can be tortured to any limit.

Dear Windows Phone OEMs, Learn from Nokia how to make your devices exclusive

According to the Digitimes (via WMPU), Handset makers in Taiwan have urged Microsoft to open up a customization for their next version of Windows Phone, popularly known as Apollo.

Why Microsoft never allowed UI Customization

Let’s take an example of the fastest growing mobile OS, Android. OEMs were quite happy that they could mold Android to whatever extent they like, and this all resulted in different and crippled user experience because there was no significant restriction.

So every Android phone from different OEMs had different UI, and it was ultimately falling on them and also on the Android.  It resulted in not only reduced battery life but also a poor user experience on slow hardware, leading in giving Android a bad name.

No wonder because of so much fragmentation, there are so many custom ROM available for Android where the UI is tweaked, and so is the performance.

All these led to one thing, ICS which came out with a tweaked UI which almost doubled my Nexus Battery life and also User Guideline for Android Phones.

So if, the most popular Mobile OS wants to come back to giving the user an excellent user experience, why are the OEMs want to mess the great UI of Windows Phone? The reason OEMs offer is this way they can make their phone different from others. It results in the second argument.

The Nokia Way: Marketing, Efficient Device & Exclusive Apps

Marketing

I don’t have to state the example of how much Nokia made an effort on Marketing their handsets. Right from4D projection at Millbank Tower, London, All Over India, to #smokedbylumia campaigns was pretty good to attract customers to Windows Phone. No Other OEM made so much effort !!!

Efficient Devices, Regular Updates, and Transparency

I am sure you must have taken a look at the Lumia Windows Phone from Nokia at least once. If, you did you know that the device is just rock-solid with a polycarbonate DNA built inside-out. In India, I have seen the same price for the other phones which Nokia Lumia came out initially but, none of the other handsets stand a chance against that build. Remember the hardware wasn’t any extraordinary but still, Nokia delivered it, Rock Solid!!.

Remember, Microsoft never said you could not have better hardware; they only set a bare minimum, keeping in mind the performance of the OS was not compromised. But even then, none of the OEM came out with powerful hardware. Though the OS honestly does not need dual cores for now (unless you want to fry eggs on it).

Nokia has brought improvement to the same hardware with software updates,  which have almost tripled the Nokia Lumia battery Life over the same hardware.

Adding to this, Nokia now also lets you find out which update is available in your country from their update page (Thanks Thurrott for sharing this). This way, Nokia is not only winning the platform but also winning users’ hearts by being open and transparent on what is going on with the update.

Exclusive Apps

The world is moving towards Apps, and if the OS is pretty smooth, you can always have an efficient app working on top of it to provide what you wanted for your handset. Now, I agree that there are restrictions, but they are there for reasons without which this OS would never have reached the stage where it is now.

Nokia did a particularly smart thing which other OEMs should have followed; they developed exclusive apps like Nokia Drive, Nokia Traffic, Nokia Creative Suit, which was only available for Nokia Devices. These apps made their handset stand out, giving an extra edge over the others.

None of the other OEMs did it until recently, HTC came out with an Offline Navigation for their Windows Phone devices.

Conclusion

We do not know what the next version of Windows Phone holds for both OEMs and End-users, but I do firmly believe that Microsoft will not give up customization of the Windows Phone in a way that will hurt the user experience.

Secondly, all other OEM should follow the path of Nokia to make their device exclusive by being transparent on their updates, provide better apps and make better phones than instead complaining about the fact that there is less option for them when compared to any other.

Nokia did prove you all wrong!!