Microsoft Dangles Windows Phones To WebOS Developers

Brandon Watson, director for Windows Phone 7, on Friday extended an invitation to WebOS developers to check out Windows Phone 7, assuring them that Microsoft would give them everything they'll need to build applications on Microsoft's mobile operating system.

"To Any Published WebOS Devs: We'll give you what you need to be successful on #WindowsPhone, [including] free phones, dev tools, and training, etc," Watson said in a Friday tweet.

Anecdotally at least, it looks like Watson's offer is generating interest from WebOS developers, at least a dozen of whom tweeted back at him with requests for more information on Windows Phone 7.

WebOS developers are facing an uncertain future in the wake of HP's decision Thursday to discontinue its TouchPad tablet and Pre3 and Veer smartphones. HP says it's "exploring options" for WebOS, one of which could be to license it to third parties, although it's unclear what sort of companies would be interested in doing so.

Microsoft last month announced the release to manufacturing of its Windows Phone 7 "Mango" update, which includes a variety of long awaited feature improvements, including application multitasking, support for Internet Explorer 9, and the "threads" capability that lets users switch between text, Windows Live Messenger and Facebook chat within the same conversation.

The Mango update is expected to help Microsoft attract more customers to Windows Phone 7, which despite a positively received user interface has yet to generate significant interest in the market. According to Gartner's Q2 mobile operating system market share report, released earlier this month, Windows Phone 7 accounted for just 1.6 percent of the market, finished behind Samsung's Bada (1.9 percent).

Microsoft has a long way to go to catch Android, which held the top spot with 43.4 percent, followed by Symbian with 22.1 percent, iOS with 18.2 percent and RIM with 11.7 percent, Gartner said in the report.