Think of Microsoft and you'll generally think of a brand at the top of their game. In the PC world, they’re numero uno, the console world they’re not far off too with the incredible Xbox One. But when it comes to mobile, it’s a software company few will even consider.
A million miles from the likes of Apple and Android, the Windows Phone market share dropped to just 4.3% in the USA last year but that could begin to climb with the $22billion brand flirting with Android and bringing their apps onto its own platform.
It’s of course a brilliant idea. Android are well at the top of the mobile market, with the likes of the Samsung selling 445 million units in 2013 alone and considerable topping the charts again last year. And that’s mainly down to its operating system.
The availability of apps is a big way in how we pick a mobile, and today, particularly with gaming, the more apps the better. At present in the Windows Store there are around 204,600 apps available to download. Compare that to Google Play’s 1.43million and it’s no contest.
Windows tapping into that however could make it a little more of a fight, and if they can get the operating system right, could really challenge its more dominant rivals.
This would undoubtedly come from the gaming market. You see, PC gaming is a huge, and continually growing industry. Whether we’re playing in a free casino online, testing our hand in a market worth around $40billion, or on the likes of Call of Duty or Minecraft, for the most part, they'll be played using a Windows operating system.
Take casino. It’s a market worth more than ever before and a popular game on both PC and phone, with almost every operator having an app in the Google Play and App Store. That could transcend into Windows Mobile if Microsoft can get their operating system right enabling it to comfortably handle high-quality, HD games, with PC gamers being a very loyal breed.
Although Microsoft themselves haven’t yet confirmed the plans just yet, rumours have been getting stronger and stronger that they are testing ways to make Android apps work on its upcoming Windows 10 Mobile.
Of course, that could come with legal ramifications. Google will certainly not be pleased about the idea, whilst it would certainly be conceding that they have an app problem. But they do, everybody knows that, and for as long as they do it'll always be playing a lowly part in the rise of mobile.
Sit on any bus or train, look on every park bench and you‘ll see people playing on their mobile. At the moment those devices are iPhones or Galaxys. Come Windows 10, and the possibility of being able to play iPhone apps, could that change? We’ll have to wait and see.
