Steve Ballmer on Windows Phone: “We haven’t sold quite as many as I would have liked”

You’ve heard it before - Steve Ballmer has previously mentioned that Windows Phone sales have gone “from very small to very small,” but now nearly a year has passed since the launch of WP7 and Microsoft’s chief executive officer drew some obvious conclusions. “We haven’t sold quite as many as I would have liked,” Ballmer said. Well, analysts have actually pointed out that after Windows Phone 7, Microsoft’s platform share on the market fell behind that of Samsung’s bada, which is plain bad. 

But the outspoken CEO remained optimistic about the future. With DirectX graphics and better mobile version of Internet Explorer, Windows Phone will aim to take that magical third ecosystem position. “I’m not saying I love where we are but I am very optimistic on where we can be,” Ballmer added. “We’ve just got to kick this thing to the next level.”

It seems, though, kicking things to the next level is what Microsoft’s mobile platforms have been trying to do in the last couple of years. The one major thing that’s changed now is not only the new, reworked WP7 with Mango, but also the support of Nokia, which has put all its horses on Windows Phone. So far, that has only contributed to Espoo’s market share slumping down at an alarming rate as it wrote off Symbian as a burning platform. But for Microsoft it seems that it has only brought benefits: “With Nokia we have a dedicated hardware partner that is all-in on Windows Phones,” Ballmer noted. “They are not doing something on Android or [any other operating system].”

The Mango update has reached its peak and the first Mango phones like the Samsung Focus S and Focus Flash are rumored to roll out on AT&T on September 18th, so we’ll soon know for sure whether Redmond has kicked it off to the next level. Patience is all it takes.

via AllThingsD