All naysaying aside, people are pretty excited about Windows Phone 7. Our readers are excited for it. I’d be outright lying if I said I wasn’t excited about it, too. Know who else is excited? The Windows Phone 7 team — but perhaps not for the reasons you’d expect.
With a few years of work finally coming to a head, some of the folks on the Windows Phone 7 team are taking a step back, looking at the fruits of their labor… and leaving. Not because they’re ashamed, and not because they’re being poached by the competition — but because instead of making Windows Phone 7, they want to make things for Windows Phone 7.
Earlier today, we received an anonymous tip that Microsoft Program Manager Mel Sampat was leaving Microsoft to do just that. After being one of the main voices behind the Windows Mobile blog for 4 years and helping to build the Calendar interface in Windows Phone 7, Mel Sampat (or “MelSam”, as he’s more commonly known) said in a letter to the team (see below) that he was departing to found mist labs, a company focusing on “helping big brands port their iPhone investments over to WM7″ along with a few original apps of their own. The company’s placeholder page also shows iPhone and Android handsets, implying that WM7 might not necessarily be the sole focus for them.
According to the tipster, MelSam isn’t alone; at least 6 other employees (who went unnamed) have recently left the team now that the product is almost out the door, many of whom seem to be interested in their own gigs rather than making the standard move to the competition.
Sampat’s letter follows:
Hey guys
after 4 amazing years in this team, I’ve decided to shake things up a bit. I’m leaving Microsoft and my last day will be Mar 12. Wtf? Well, as some of you know, I was an ISV before coming to Microsoft, and made a decent living writing Pocket PC apps way back in the good old days when we were kicking ass with WM5. After seeing the great reception 7 has received, the dormant entrepreneur in me has resurrected with a huge urge to write apps again. I see an opportunity in a few original ideas I have, as well as helping big brands port their iPhone investments over to WM7. So I’m starting a new company and hope to have some cool WM7 stuff “ready in time for holiday 2010″.It’s been a pleasure & honor to work alongside so many of you. I will support Microsoft from the outside, and wish nothing but the best for 7. Thanks again for your friendship, comradry and “teachable moments” since 2006. Stay in touch and feel free to drop me a line if you ever need the ISV perspective on something. I leave my features in the able hands of Steve May and the rest of the Time Management team, who deserve credit for the Calendar experience I helped build.
How to find me:
[Removed]
See you down the road.
-MelSam
I see this a very good sign for the platform. Anyone willing to risk their lively hood on a platform knows/thinks that it really has been built well. I wish these people the best of luck and am personally looking forward to the mobile OS battle to come.
This really could be the killer feature that drives WinPhone adoption. While a phone needs to be a phone first and foremost, gaming is a huge value-add to any modern device.
With this, I’m hoping that major studios will bring their XNA experience to the table and produce some killer games to the windows phone.
It seems to me that MelSam has some kind of inside information from the hire ups. This info is probably along the lines that Microsoft isn’t willing to expand the scope of this project to include the importing of big brands onto the WM7 and to create their own brand of apps for it. So in my opinion he is pretty smart to get into the hunt this early for this market segment with his inside knowledge of the shell scripting, now everyone else has to compete with him. My reasoning on this is that the competition will be at a major disadvantage in the development and installation stage because he already knows what will work and what won’t.
Hmm very interesting. Sounds like there’s going to be some good opportunities for app developers with Windows Phone 7.
. Anyone willing to risk their lively hood on a platform knows/thinks that it really has been built well.
Risk their livelyhood? It isn’t like he’s going off to war.
What they realize is that they can make more money writing apps than working for the company that makes the platform.
It is almost like the reverse gold rush where the only people that really made money were Levi’s and pick axe manufacturers. Sure MSFT and Apple are making money on mobile but that doesn’t trickle down to the employees doing the work.
This may be correct but right now, no one makes money from windows phone 7. So it’s quite a risk to jump into a job where you are making no money and have confidence in the future. Income for most of us is a livelyhood even if we don’t want it to be.
At least the guy is jumping before anyone else. And by doing iPhone ports… I think is going to be heaven $$$. Maybe is a long term smart move.
“All naysaying aside” ?! Greg, OMG, which naysaying?! I haven’t seen a single negative word about Windows Phone 7 Series except for TechCrunch’s lack of coverage. Do you mind enlightening your readers? Or do you mean “naysaing” because it’s a Microsoft product?
TechCrunch is live-blogging stupid announcements from SXSW but I have to go to engadget.com to read anything about MIX.
Anti-MS spirits in TC have now changed into lack of editorial coverage.
And I’m still waiting for Michael to admit that after the $$ in free TC advertizing for the Nexus One the product is a dog.
I have to agree with tccritic.
I am really growing weary of the penchant for bloggers to constantly qualify everything Microsoft does that might be innovative (e.g., XBox Live, Windows 7 Phone, LINQ, Bing improvements, etc.) with all kinds of qualifying statements. And where is the MIX coverage?
I love the iPhone as a user, and am an iPhone developer. I also love Ruby — it’s a great platform.
If the product looks good to you, and you’re looking forward to it, that’s great. Don’t feel you’ve got to qualify your statements just to stay with the “in” crowd. After all, isn’t breaking free of groupthink the kind of “Think Different” that Apple so iconically and brilliantly told us we need to do?
[disclosure -- I was a MSFT employee from '91-'97]
I also have to agree with tccritic as most of the time I have been commenting on the biasness TC seems to show nowadays.
iPhone is good yes! but Nokia still rules the world by a margin too far! (you need to travel fellas Africa knows Nokia by soul)
OSX is used and nice yes! I trust only die hard Americans are the ones happy with it. There is a larger world outside the states whose population almost entirely has never seen a copy of OS-what! forget about Mac machine (I’have used a mac myself but I am considered a no-joke geek by most)
Michael, MG, Greg — wake-up guys!
So none of the above posters can spot this simply as a MS employee being encouraged from within to go and write some apps for a fledgling service coming a whole 3 years late to the party?!
sounds to me that MS are worried that there isn’t enough interest in developing for their latest ‘Me too’ project…
Why do you think its late? technology is constantly changing. The iphone OS will be updated sometime this summer. People are still going to buy phones.. people are have locked in 2/3 year contracts and like new phones when they’re up.
The 3 year’s of iphone have shown modest updates. The apps being shown at MIX (engadget) look great and hopefully more will be developed till the release.
My contract is almost up 1 year left, and I will see what the iphone has up it’s sleeve. IF its more of the same then ill wait for a WP7S, I already love the hub UI.
Why do I think it’s late?
Windows had a head start on mobile development but did feck-all with it
lame-arse UI – crappy user experience – and didn’t seem to realise there might be some value in developing some sort of… what shall we call it? .. ‘vibrant and easily accessible app store’
other than that, yes – you’re right! they’ve a proven record in mobile platform development…
So what do you suggest the average consumer do about their next phone purchase? Oh Gosh, dont say it…….
Apple (proud) fanboi here. I, too, would be a lying sack of sh*t if I said this thing didn’t look absolutely incredible… Kudos for not following a “me too” mentality. The gaming will push this thing…
That being said, The Facebook app that followed the 7 UI for MinMo looks pretty also. It’s just an absolute bitch to use. It’s gorgeousness actually gets in the way of it’s functionality. I hope that is not the case with the phone.
Based on a survey data from majority of seasoned developers for .Net, we were also very surprised at the level of interest observed for the new Windows Phone Series 7 operating system.
Here is a link to the latest research paper on Silverlight and Windows Phone Series 7:
http://discountaspnet.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!FC24ECAD565F3E2C!768.entry
Download the research paper:
http://cid-fc24ecad565f3e2c.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/.Public/State-of-Silverlight-DiscountASPNET-Report-March-10-2010.docx
no thanks, I’ve got to watch paint dry
are there any windows used in windows phone series 7? why not just call it microsoft phone?
They should have called it the WinPhone!
You guys are missing the point. Windows Phone 6.5 apps are not compatible with Windows Phone 7. What does that mean?
If I were starting a mobile company, I would make a short list of the top 100 iPhone apps out there and pick a few to “clone”. Once Windows Phone 7 launches…you can make a killing being one of the first developers.
From a consulting perspective…imagine all those enterprises that have Blackberries that now can have internal Business Intelligence, collaboration Silverlight applications.
and then, when the demand for WP7S apps turns out to be non-existent, they can blame you for the idea when their investors start complaining. remember the zune.
Do the math… WinMo is current selling around 3M handsets per quarter so 12M per year. Every 3rd party app for WP7 has to be re-written. So if you’re the first person to clone 1 popular iPhone app for WP7 and that app gets downloaded by 10% of users at $0.99 per copy, you’ll make a $840,000 profit your first year (70% revenue split.)
It doesn’t matter how popular the device becomes… The numbers say Mels company stands to make a few million dollars minimum within their first year. That’s worth quiting for…
Of the 12million winmo phones sold each year, I bet at least 6mil are corporate users such as HP.
I smell Zune.