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Microsoft has a set of new tools and services that any developer can use to create apps for any mobile OS. By “any mobile OS”, the choices are limited to the top three: Android, iOS, and Windows Phone. Fair enough. Microsoft has always claimed that the smartphone war was going to be a 3-horse race. Now Windows Phone is effectively rooted in the number three spot. This is despite its relatively smaller market share compared to the top two.
This package of tools is being pushed under the tag, “Any Dev, Any App”. Microsoft claims that the tools help you create engaging apps for Android, iOS and Windows Phone with ease. The catch is that the old Microsoft would never, ever do something like this. They would attempt to lock you down to their platform and theirs alone. This new open Microsoft is a very interesting one. The goal is to get Microsoft services to people regardless of what they use. Which sounds brilliant.
What this will produce for Windows Phone remains to be seen though. But however it plays out for Microsoft’s mobile OS, the company is on the right track. Say hello to the Universal Microsoft.
Founder of MobilityArena. Yomi’s journey in mobile started in 2001. Besides obsessing over mobile phones, he also started creating WAP sites (early mobile-friendly websites created with WML). He began writing about phones in 2004 and has been at it since then. He has owned over 200 devices, from Symbian, Palm, PocketPC/Windows Mobile, BlackBerry/BB10, webOS, Windows Phone, Firefox, Ubuntu Touch, to Android, iOS, and KaiOS operating systems.
