• Michael
• On June 7, 2017

Continuum will be the main focal point of a new generation of Windows phones

Microsoft is about to reboot its presence in the mobile market with a new strategy. Instead of competing with traditional mobile platforms like iOS and Android, Microsoft will blur the line between PC and phone thanks to Windows 10’s Composable Shell – an adaptive UI that runs across the whole range of devices, and scales in real time between form factors and display sizes.

So, in fact, Microsoft will market the new generation of smartphones as ultra-mobile PCs with phone capabilities which can be connected to external display. The Composable Shell (CShell) for Windows 10 will unleash an improved Continuum experience, so users could run apps just like on a normal PC in windowed mode. Currently, phones like Lumia 950 can only run one app at the same time, and the app takes the entire screen.

Andromeda OS (the codename for Windows 10 with CShell) on a mobile device will rely on UWP apps. We already reported that Microsoft is considering to remove support for legacy Silverlight apps, and many companies have stopped updating (or removed) their Windows Phone apps in the Store. It’s clear that the Universal Windows Platform is very important for the success of any future mobile device. Users who want to be productive with the ultimate mobile device need classy apps.

But we learn that not only UWP apps will be supported on Windows 10 CShell for Mobile. Classic Win32 apps could also be opened in Continuum mode thanks to emulation, which makes the mobile devices far more productive.

The ultimate mobile device has long been in the words of Microsoft’s leaders, but we’ve yet to see any concrete evidence of its existence.

Will Microsoft finally succeed in its attempts to bring Windows to the phone?