Microsoft: We'll Sell 30 Million Phones in 18 Months

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Microsoft has great expectations for Windows Phone 7.

With the Kin One and Two impressing approximately no one, the world is looking to Windows Phone 7 to see what Microsoft is really bringing to the table in terms of competition for Apple and Google.

The first WP7 consignment is due in the fall of this year. Ballmer says in time for the holidays but several reports suggest some manufacturers will get their ducks in a line in time for a September launch. Despite a launch that is no where close to the Windows Phone 7 announcement (which was back in March), Microsoft is extremely optimistic about the OS and how many phones the company will shift.

Microsoft is estimating they'll sell 30 million Windows Phone 7 devices by the end of 2011, or in the next 18 months. When you take away the three months between now and September, that gives Microsoft just 15 months to sell 30 million units. That's 2 million phones per month.

At a ReMix conference in France yesterday, Microsoft said it expects 40 percent of the phones sold in 2011 to be smartphones. This is compared with just 14 percent of phones this year. It seems the company believes that with this high number, the company believes it can shift 30 million devices by the end of 2011.

MobileTechWorld, which attended the conference, reminds us that to date, Apple has sold 51,234,000 iPhones.

Jane McEntegart
46 Comments Comment from the forums
  • kyeana
    Heh. Good luck with that one... You're gonna need it.
    Reply
  • donovands
    Def. not on the back of the uber uggo Kins.
    Reply
  • burnley14
    With the Kin One and Two impressing approximately no one

    Couldn't have said it better myself, Jane. Those phones suck.
    Reply
  • aneasytarget
    If MSFT gives heavy subsidies so the phones are under $99 each, they could sell that many phones worldwide. Although, I would be surprised if they can sell 10M in the next 18 months.
    Reply
  • cryogenic
    They've managed to beat Sony at their game, while being late to the party. I hope they manage to beat Apple in the same way, because that's what Microsoft is good at.
    Reply
  • I wonder if they think they can sell that many because the smartphone market is going to grow so large that even if they get only 20% of it, it it still 30mil phones.

    Or do they think they have some sort of Ace up their Sleeve with the new Windows 7 phones. Something that will make them obviously superior to Android.
    Reply
  • outacontrolpimp
    Wow 51 million iPhones... I thought there would be around 20 million sold. I guess it was never important enough for me to keep up with.
    Reply
  • zoemayne
    If apple has sold 51 million android will be in second or 1st place I doubt MSFT can even get ahead of apple cause apple have alot of sheep that just like apples.
    Reply
  • cadder
    The secret is lots of hip advertising, just like Apple does.

    OTOH anybody with past WM phone experience will probably stay away from them. My current WM phone is not very impressive- it has a very slow browser, its gps doesn't work, it has a difficult menu system. The sound quality isn't too bad though.
    Reply
  • Sicundercover
    Well the iPhone is limited to AT&T here in the US, so W7 phone at least has a broad market. Im not a fan of the Android OS at all and I think the only real reason it has sold a lot is because of the broad carrier support.
    Reply