Microsoft has now officially discontinued the KIN. We first heard of this from a story at Gizmodo, and now Microsoft has gone on record a few times about its decision. Microsoft’s official statement:
We have made the decision to focus exclusively on Windows Phone 7 and we will not ship KIN in Europe this fall as planned. Additionally, we are integrating our KIN team with the Windows Phone 7 team, incorporating valuable ideas and technologies from KIN into future Windows Phone releases. We will continue to work with Verizon in the U.S. to sell current KIN phones.
Kin One and Kin Two had some compelling features, and they represented a new and adventurous mobile approach for Microsoft. They were also the first mobile devices to carry Microsoft’s branding. Microsoft certainly learned some lessons from its Kin experience, and now it will try to apply these to Windows Phone 7, a release with far greater importance to company’s long term future.
