The new version of Windows Phone 7, codenamed Tango, is aimed at emerging markets and the public sector. Windows Phone 8, codenamed Apollo, will support all applications developed for its previous version.
The main task of Windows Phone 7.6 Tango, which Microsoft is going to present to the general public at the end of February in Barcelona at the Mobile World Congress, is to enter the market of budget devices in developing countries, where Android feels at ease now.
This is the reason for the two main innovations of Tango, which Microsoft recently announced: support for 120 languages (Windows Phone 7.5 Mango supports 35, Android 55, and iOS only 34 languages) and a reduction in the requirements for components of smartphones based on the system. Now for Windows Phone to work, it will be enough to have 256 MB of RAM in the smartphone, and not 512 Mb, as it was before.
As for Windows 8 Phone, according to the company’s representatives, it will be compatible with all applications developed for Windows Phone 7. So all 60 thousand programs that are currently in the Microsoft mobile market will be immediately available for purchase and download to Windows Phone 8 users.
Microsoft also confirmed that in future versions of Windows Phone developers will have the opportunity to use native C++ code.