Windows Phone 7

Microsoft started from scratch when developing Windows Phone 7 (WP7), and it shows. The tile-based user interface is beautiful, intuitive and organizes information for at-a-glance reading. For business users, it is the only mobile platform that supports Word, Excel and PowerPoint.

The story for software development is notably better than that for iPhone and Blackberry. It uses a version of .NET and, for game developers, it supports XNA. The development toolset is robust and feature-rich because it reuses most of the mature, industry-leading Windows development tools.

It is not surprising then that this Gartner smartphone sales forecast and this IDC Windows Phone 7 forecast predict that WP7 will become the second best-selling mobile OS by 2015 after Android. Yes, ahead of iPhone and BlackBerry!