Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 is the newest mobile platform out there, but there are already plenty of changes in the works.
In his keynote address at this week’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) CEO Steve Ballmer described several key updates coming to the mobile platform.
The software giant has to be ready to embark on a fast innovation cycle if it hopes to make headway against market leaders like the iPhone, BlackBerry and devices based on Google’s Android software. It’s already made one bold move, last week’s blockbuster announcement of a deal with Nokia that will get the Windows Phone 7 mobile OS in the Finnish handset maker’s smartphones.
As for new features coming to Windows Phone 7 this year, Microsoft said to expect multitasking, a version of Internet Explorer 9, tight Twitter integration, and Office document support in the cloud.
Microsoft plans to release a minor update to Windows Phone 7, which provides a few bug fixes and adds the ability to perform cut and paste, sometime in the next month.
Read Enterprise Mobile Today’s full report on Ballmer’s talk as well as comments Nokia CEO Steven Elop made in a separate keynote.