Microsoft emerges from last chance saloon with guns blazing

We had numerous conversations on the sidelines of the show with industry insiders who predicted that the current number of mobile operating systems was unsustainable and likely to be reduced or consolidated over the next year or so. But opinion was divided on who would succeed and who would fail. Microsoft's Windows Mobile was one such platform coming into the show on the backfoot and in dire need of a makeover. It got just that. After being in development for what seemed like an age (in fact it was only two years), the newly-named 'Windows Phone 7 Series' represented a complete redesign of the operating system. By integrating it with its various gaming (Xbox) and music (Zune) offerings, and with a clear focus on social networking, the new platform marks a belated play for the consumer market and a clear break from the clunky business-focused Windows phones of yore (RIM is one rival that has successfully managed such a transition in recent years).

Microsoft clearly plans to take a lot more control over Series 7 than it has done with earlier versions, making it closer to Apple's model than the Linux-based open-source camp in which Google's Android is a member. The first Series 7 phones are not expected till year end - by which the point the platform risks already being outdated - so the jury remains out till then. But as one senior mobile figure told us last week, "you underestimate Microsoft at your peril." Other major developments in the OS space included the launch of the first Samsung smartphone based on its own bada platform, and the merger between Nokia's Maemo and Intel's Moblin to create a new Linux platform called MeeGo. However, Nokia released no new handsets at all, making it an ominously quiet Congress for Symbian, which remains – and you'd be forgiven for letting this slip your mind - the world's largest smartphone OS.

(This article is part of a series of follow-ups on Mobile World Congress 2010 from the GSMA Intelligence team.)