The Windows Mobile operating system has long been bashed for its inconsistent consumer image. This is due to the goofy way Microsoft handles OS updates: The folks in Redmond produce an OS update, and the handset makers decide if they will offer it on specific phone models. They in turn offer the upgrade to the carriers that offer the phones, which then decide if they will provide the update to their customers. This crazy process not only means that different phone models within an OEM’s product line have different OS versions but that the same phone model can have different OS versions on different carriers. Confused yet? So are consumers.

The smartphone market has grown in recent years, with sales increasing each quarter in spite of the poor economy. Consumers have come to expect a lot from their phones and users’ experience is a critical factor in any smartphone’s success. The operating system is the primary piece of the customer satisfaction puzzle. How quickly a company provides updates to fix flaws in the operating system is a big part of the consumer’s perception regarding a particular phone.  Unfortunately, it seems that the importance of this update process is often overlooked by the carriers that offer the phones to consumers.

Mobile OS providers must come to grips with the fact that carriers are in the business to sell phone service, not handsets. Service provision is their core business, and the carriers have proven repeatedly that providing good phone support is not their big mission. It is up to the OS providers to make sure that updates can be distributed to customer’s phones in a timely manner and if that means removing the carriers from the process, then so be it.