Post CES 2010 : Microsoft VP Depics Cloud-oriented Windows Mobile

During a Thursday financial analysts' conference at CES 2010, whose transcript has recently been released by Microsoft (DOCX available here), Microsoft Entertainment & Devices division president Robbie Bach painted a broad-brushstroke picture of the Windows Mobile-related announcement the company intends to make next month at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Certain carefully phrased elements of that broad outline do offer distinct clues as to the direction the company plans to take with the product, which may be different than some have speculated.

Most telling of all is an analogy Bach cited that implies that whatever does get revealed in five weeks' time may not be a product or service in its entirety, but rather the beginning of a long-range construction project that had not been under development during all this time that customers had been waiting for Windows Mobile 7.

At one point, Bach stated he believed Microsoft needed to demonstrate a dramatic difference over its current mobile offerings. He then added he felt the company had not been as strong as it should have been in presenting a market presence for itself in mobile -- a problem he feels is being remedied by the creation of the "Windows Phone" brand.

In that context, he pointed to the need for a third leg of the project: "Once you get past those things, then you get the opportunity to do a lot of other things. I think there are services opportunities, I think there are search opportunities. I think there are other opportunities we can build on top of that. But, those are sort of the ante to be a serious competitor and somebody who people can look at and say, wow, I think these guys are going to build a big business here and it may take them a little bit of time, but these guys are serious."

In terms of what Bach means by "a little bit of time," he clarified that point during a response to an analyst question much later (the majority of the conference involved discussion of Xbox 360 and the 'Project Natal' bodily-gesture control system). Bach was questioned about whether, amid Android and Palm and BlackBerry and iPhone, there was actually any room left for Windows Mobile.