For all of its shortcomings, the Windows Mobile platform was able to gain some traction with business users thanks to its strong integration with Microsoft’s enterprise software. The upcoming Windows Phone 7 features multiple user interfaces changes to make it a more consumer-friendly platform but Microsoft wants you to know that it will still be a good corporate citizen.
On its Windows Phone blog, the company emphasized the business features of the upcoming platform. Microsoft provides much of the software for the corporate world, so WP7 will have strong integration with things like Exchange, SharePoint and Office. These will all be put together in the Office hub (check out the video at the bottom for more details).
It will have the security features you expect like PIN codes, passwords and the ability to transmit data through 128 or 256 Bit SSL Encryption. The Windows Marketplace for Mobile will also have a verification and security process to ensure programs that are downloaded from this market aren’t corrupt. Remember, this will be the only place consumers can download apps from.
Windows Phone 7 is a new platform that we will continue to improve and evolve. We needed to restart in order to build the right foundation for the future. We are delivering a great business phone that improves productivity by taking a fresh approach to the most common smartphone business usage scenarios such as email, calendar, contacts and collaboration.At the same time, with support for Silverlight, XNA and the full suite of development and design tools from Visual Studio 2010 to Expressions, Windows Phone 7 provides a rich, efficient and familiar development platform that also meets the IT needs of many organizations with support for the most common EAS policies for management.
Will a snazzy, new UI be enough to help Microsoft displace Research In Motion in the corporate space? It’s going to be tough, as RIM is firmly entrenched and has its own new OS coming out in the fall. I’ve always felt the corporate mobility space should have been Microsoft’s from the beginning (it powers nearly everything in the enterprise world), so it will be fun to watch its renewed push for this market.
We had a chance to take a look at the Office hub and you can check it out with the embedded video below.
[Via Windows Phone blog]