Microsoft ends cheap Android smartphone line Nokia X

Microsoft is ending the Nokia X line of cheap Android devices. The company made this known when announcing the extensive reorganization. Instead, the company will make even cheaper Lumias.

The move from Nokia X to Lumia products makes sense because of “the success in the market for affordable smartphones” and it would also be consistent with the group’s strategy to focus on Windows Universal Apps.

Microsoft is going to convert devices that were in the pipeline as Nokia X devices to Lumias: those smartphones will be cheaper than the current cheapest Lumias. Nokia did that before, releasing designs it had made as MeeGo devices as Windows Phones.

The Nokia X smartphones were an odd one out, but Microsoft’s pulling the plug comes as a surprise. Microsoft was behind the release of the Nokia X series and continued to do so even after the acquisition. Presumably the X-series was a strategy prior to Nadella’s appointment as CEO and the new director has decided that it does not fit in with his new strategy.

Nokia released the first series of X devices in March, followed by the Nokia X2 in June. In addition, the first generation will no longer receive updates four months after the release, because the software of the new device is not compatible with the first generation of devices.