• GigaOm, Wednesday, August 19, 2009 1:38 PM

Taking on both Android- and iPhone-based platforms, Microsoft is reportedly planning to adopt a dual platform strategy to promote its Windows Mobile operating system.

If the rumors are true, the dual-platform strategy would allow Microsoft to compete with Android-based platform using Windows Mobile 6.5 and also compete with iPhones leveraging Windows Mobile. Microsoft is expected to officially launch Windows Mobile 6.5 in October, and add an upgrade version with a touch interface by next February.

As far as GagaOM is concerned, this would only lead to market confusion and ruin Microsoft's mobile ambitions, noting, "No wonder Microsoft is becoming irrelevant on the mobile platform."

The prospect of confusion occurred to InformationWeek, too, but it figured that "most gadget geeks will be able to easily distinguish between the two platforms once they are shipping side by side and will almost always go for the device that runs 7."

InformationWeek, however, is assuming that any 6.5 devices that ship in the next twelve months will be eligible for an upgrade to 7, which may or may not be the case.

The Boy Genius Report, meanwhile, can't even believe the reports. "We're not saying it's impossible but it seems highly unlikely that Microsoft would choose to maintain two concurrent and very different mobile operating systems -- especially when the company has struggled to be innovative with the single version of Windows Mobile it has been developing for the past nine years."

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