Microsoft launched its first flagship smartphones on the Windows 10 operating system in India on Monday as the US company strives to attract retail and enterprise users and catch up with rival platforms from Google and Apple.
The Lumia 950 and Lumia 950 XL devices come with features such as an Indian-voiced personal assistant Cortana, Microsoft Edge and Continuum software and are aimed at getting more consumers on the Windows 10 operating system, which is used in over 110 million devices globally, the company said. "We see our phones as driver of our strategy and an integral part of growing the Windows ecosystem," said Microsoft India chairman Bhaskar Pramanik.
The Windows platform, with a 1.7% share of the world's smartphones, has a long way to go to catch up with runaway leaders Android with 84.7% and even No. 2 ranked iOS, with 13.1%, as per Gartner's data for the third quarter of 2015. Lumia 950 and Lumia 950 XL are priced at Rs 43,699 and Rs 49,399, respectively, which places them in the premium segment, against the new Apple iPhones and Samsung's S6, S6 Edge and S6 Edge Plus, which are more expensive.
The new devices will be available for pre-order beginning Monday on Amazon.in and will be up for sale from December 11 through major retail chains including Croma, Sangeetha and Reliance. To set itself apart from the competition in the premium segment, the latest Microsoft devices come with Continuum, which allows a television or PC screen to be used like Windows 10 PC, wirelessly through Miracast and wired through Display Dock, which costs Rs 5,999.
As a launch offer, the dock will be given free with the phone. "I'm going to play to our strengths and then grow our share, but I need to do this profitably... We're not the right guys to come out with a product which is 'El Cheapo' - that's not where our innovation should go," Pramanik said. "That's where people who are very good at mass production are better suited to do and we look to them to take our technology, marry it with their products and offer it to the marketplace," he added, indicating that the company would tie up with other handset makers to propagate the Windows 10 operating system.
No comments:
Post a Comment