Comment by bbarn

Palm and Microsoft both made incredible (for the time) smart phones. The iPhone (and to a lesser extent android phones) were just on a totally different level. While Windows CE and PalmOS phones were trying to fight off blackberry, the iPhone was a different animal all together. The later Microsoft phones trying to compete on that level made a massive mistake of trying to tie in a bad UI design (the windows 8 square tiles for days UI) to it's desktop.

It was all timing, and by the time the war was over, MS would have had to become revolutionary in a field that pretty much every new thing had already been done, so it made sense for them to throw in the towel and get back to their money maker - business apps.