Windows Phone “Mango” – Released to Manufacturing

I wanted to drop into the Windows Phone Blog briefly to update you on an important milestone. Earlier this morning, the Windows Phone development team officially signed off on the release to manufacturing (RTM) build of “Mango” – the latest version of the Windows Phone operating system. This marks the point in the development process where we hand code to our handset and mobile operator partners to optimize Mango for their specific phone and network configurations. Here on the Windows Phone team, we now turn to preparing for the update process. The Mango update for current Windows Phone handsets will be ready this fall, and of course will come pre-installed on new Windows Phones.

In May, we officially took the wraps off of Mango, a release including hundreds of new features that create a smarter and easier approach to communications and apps, while delivering the best web experience. My favorites?

· Our unique new email Conversation View which helps me to efficiently participate in long email discussions with my friends and co-workers.

· Threads that bring together my text, IM, and Facebook chat all into one conversation.

· App Multitasking, enabling me to efficiently work on my email, listen to music, and then pop in and out of Words By Post games when it is my turn. Mango also connects apps to search results and deepens integration within the Hubs like Music and Video and Pictures.

· Internet Explorer 9 for fast web browsing and support for new HTML 5 web sites.

We can’t wait to get Mango in your hands so you can experience all the new features for yourself and give us feedback on where to go next. As we reach additional milestones we will be back to share more but until then, thank you for your support of Windows Phone.

-Terry