Microsoft hints at February release for Windows Mobile 7.0

Paul Nesbitt

During his CES keynote Microsoft CEO, Steve Ballmer hardly mentioned Windows Mobile 7.0 other than to say that all would be revealed at February's GSM Mobile Congress in Barcelona. This strongly points to a February launch for Windows Mobile 7.0 although phones running Microsoft's OS will appear later this year.

'We will have a lot more to say about phones next month at Mobile World Congress,' said Ballmer, fending off questions about Microsoft's plans for its smartphone OS.

However Microsoft staffers have warned that actual handsets running Windows Mobile 7 will not appear until the third quarter of this year at the earliest.

Meanwhile at the CES 2010 show, LG revealed that it will release new lines of smartphones running Windows Mobile 7 'late this year', during a presentation.

The waning fortunes and declining market share of Windows Mobile as a smartphone OS mean that the next release will need to be a significant improvement of Windows Mobile 6.5. Windows Mobile 7 has also been subject to several significant delays as Microsoft struggles to get it just right.

Last year Microsoft revealed it had a team of 1,000 developers working full time on Windows Mobile 7 and that one of the new features would be the integration of social networking into the OS. This has prompted some industry observers to predict the release of Facebook-branded Windows Mobile handset.