Projects & Projects

This year turned out not to be successful for Microsoft. Pebble and Stone are not the first projects to be terminated. Courier, a very promising Internet tablet was strangled in Microsoft labs several months ago. Many people all over the world were salivating over its promo presented at Microsoft’s site. All of them were ready  to spend even more than Apple charged for its iPad to put their hands on it. The gadget really provided a range of possibilities  being a folding tablet with a stylus. Despite neglectful Jobs’ remarks concerning the use of a stylus in a tablet, many people all over the world consider  it an indispensable tool. Maybe touch interface is natural. But it was a stick, its usage to be more precise that helped to distinguish a man-like ape from an ape-like man. But nevertheless the project was terminated though official Microsoft representatives tried to calm their potential users claiming all the technologies obtained while working on the Courier prototype will be used in other Microsoft products which are to hit the market in the near future. Most analysts share the opinion that so far it is impossible to reach the promised functionality, thus proving that Apple is the flagman of the world smartphone and tablet technologies.

Another project that was destined to obscurity is the renowned Slate with Windows 7 on it as the basic OS environment. The tablet used to be a partnership project of both HP and Microsoft. While HP was to provide the hardware, Microsoft was responsible for the software part.  The prototype was presented in January by Microsoft CEO Ballmer himself but after HP’s acquisition of Palm the project seemed to stall and was later terminated. HP claimed that the company was not satisfied with abilities Microsoft OS presented. Taking into account that Palm’s main dowry was webOS, a really good smartphone platform, which did not reach the market success only because of  shortsighted marketing policy and management, it is quite clear that HP is going to submit to the market a tablet, produced  by the company itself. The HP’s move seemed a big disappointment for Microsoft, especially after the Courier had been abandoned.

The termination of Kins may make many people all over the world think over the question, whether the era of Microsoft as a market leader has been a matter of past. Maybe Microsoft yet has some trumps, may be it is going to be resting on its Windows for desktops  laurels. But it is clear that Microsoft is experiencing hard times.