Posted by Tom Krengel
on 03/11/10
Microsoft and Adobe are "working closely" on the effort, according to Mike Chambers, product manager for developer relations for the Flash Platform at Adobe. "Adobe and Microsoft are working together to bring Flash Player 10.1 to Internet Explorer Mobile on Windows Phone 7 Series," Chambers said in a Tuesday blog post.
Chambers didn't say anything about Flash being used for native application development in Windows Phone 7, and that's because Microsoft plans to use Silverlight for this purpose. This will enable Microsoft to get developers working on Windows Phone 7 apps using familiar tools, and supporting Flash in IE Mobile will maintain a bridge to other types of content and allow Microsoft to talk about its commitment to interoperability.
Apple, of course, doesn't support Flash on the iPhone or the iPad, CEO Steve Jobs has been taking shots at Flash in recent months, reportedly deriding it as a "CPU hog" that's full of security holes. But Microsoft has set beefy minimum hardware specifications for Windows Phone 7 OEMs, which suggests that Flash may be able to run smoothly on these devices, Meeker said.
Microsoft wants consumers to get excited about Windows Phone 7 devices, and adding more functionality would help. But Windows Mobile is in the midst of a freefall, as its share of the smartphone market fell from 19.7 percent in October to 15.7 percent in January, while Android grew from 2.8 percent to 7.1 percent during the period, according to comScore figures released Wednesday.
Microsoft has a lot of ground to make up, but by empowering developers and removing roadblocks to users that want to consume Flash content on mobile devices, Microsoft is making a shrewd move that could help it reach its goal of luring consumers away from the popular smartphone platforms du jour.
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