Microsoft Seeks More Mobile Relevance

The relevance is a two-fold objective, but with separate goals. For customers, Microsoft seeks to provide more relevant information, such as local search, maps and traffic data. For itself, Microsoft pulls the relevance back to the client, delivering these services through software rather than a just a Web browser.

Additionally, the announcements again confirm--contrary to some speculation among bloggers and news organizations--that Windows Live isn't dead. Live brand changes are afoot, but that's another topic.

Microsoft announced two mobile products that have been beta testing for some time: Windows Live for Windows Mobile and Live Search for Windows Mobile and Live Search for Java. The latter product, for two different mobile clients, is more important to the aforementioned two areas of relevance.

By providing a Java client, Microsoft can extend services to non-Windows Mobile devices.

Maintaining Microsoft's Relevance
The question of relevance is important to Microsoft as it seeks to push back the threat posed by Web 2.0, which I refer to the Web platform.

The Web platform, encapsulated by Google, is to Microsoft what Microsoft was to IBM a quarter century ago. IBM had a huge monopoly in mainframe computers, which only large businesses could afford. The size and cost of mainframes greatly constrained informational utility; people consumed information from terminals tethered to the big computers. When the PC came along, IBM embraced it, seeing no direct threat to its computing dominance.

However, Microsoft and its IBM-PC clone partners did compete with mainframes. The PC extended informational and computing utility to more customers, for a fraction of mainframe costs. IBM's mainframe monopoly continued, but its relevance changed as the PC economy exploded. IBM most certainly continued and it remains a computing and services giant even today. But the PC also changed IBM's business and the relevance of the mainframe.

The Web platform promises even greater informational and computing freedom: Access anytime, anywhere, on anything. The broader threat is really the Internet, which Microsoft tried to push back in the late 1990s during the browser wars, when Internet Explorer was integrated with Windows. The Internet offered huge informational utility, with no Windows required.

A decade later, Microsoft grapples with a renewed Internet threat, but fiercer than before. The success of Google search has increased informational utility; there are more informational clients (such as the cell phone); and more developers are developing for the Web platform. The Internet remains Microsoft's biggest informational threat and, at the same time, opportunity. Microsoft has pushed back by doing what it does well: code client software, which can help maintain or pull back informational relevance to the desktop. Web platform companies like Google seek to pull relevance to the browser and the Web.

The PC is Microsoft's home turf, but the mobile device also can connect to the Internet--and it's an even more natural communications and informational search platform than the desktop PC. According to market researcher Strategy Analytics, cell phone shipments topped 1 billion in 2006. If Microsoft loses the turf war on the cell phone, there is potentially greater risk to software relevance on the desktop. Meanwhile, there is shifting relevance, as more information is made available anytime, anywhere and on anything.

Extending Relevance to Customers
Microsoft's quest to maintain the relevance of client software is as much about extending device relevance to customers. Beyond telephony the cell phone's portability makes it a natural Internet informational client.

With both new Live products, Microsoft seeks to increase informational utility and relevance via client software, rather than relying more on a Web browser. Client software can overcome some of the inherent problems with Web services consumed on a cell phone, particularly presentation on a smaller screen.

Matt Champagne, director of mobile product management for MSN and Windows Live, said that Microsoft looked at different mobile informational delivery scenarios. Particularly on mobile devices, software clients "delight end users more" than the Web browser, he said.

Google offers mobile services--and Yahoo, for that matter--some of which are client based. But the informational and mobile user relevance is tied more to the service than to the software client, at least with Google. Google added New York subway stops to its mapping service today, by the way. Yahoo is a bit more embracing on the client. Today, the media company updated Yahoo Go 2.0.

Beyond utilities like corporate e-mail, Microsoft believes that local information is the most relevant to people looking to access the Internet from a mobile device. Using Live Search for Windows Mobile and Live Search for Java, mobile users can find maps and get directions; check local traffic (in 25 cities); and search for local services and businesses by categories. Microsoft also enhances local search, mapping and directions via GPS, for hardware supporting Windows Mobile-based devices. GPS capabilities are not available via the Java client. The GPS function would let mobile users see where they are in relationship to what they are looking for.

"This is taking with you in your pocket all you see in a PC application [but] customized for a mobile device," said Darcie de Freitas, product manager for Live Search for Mobile.

From a revenue perspective, Microsoft isn't yet ready to go where it needs to. Local advertising won't be available until a future version of the mobile search software, de Freitas said. The market opportunity is huge. According to Borrell Associates, local advertising will near $8 billion in 2007.

Windows Live for Windows Mobile (there's one too many Windows in the name) extends relevance in both directions, for Microsoft and the end user. The service "synchs the contact list every time you are connected," Champagne said. The contact list is central to the three major functions: e-mail, instant messaging and blogging.

The software pulls off some nifty tricks that aren't readily available via mobile Web browsers, such as sending video clips while in an IM conversation.

More importantly, Microsoft extends Live services to another device, and it's one people are more likely to carry around than a PC.