But does that business even exist? I'd love to see some investigative reporting on this issue. Most of the other deals have hints of quid pro quos like funding advertising for Windows laptops, so basically those companies are taking money in return for PR against non-Microsoft OSes, but continuing to use those non-Microsoft products themselves. It's all very odd.

The Nokia deal could also be seen as Nokia being worth more to Microsoft than to Google because if they adopted Android it could have seriously tilted the market away from all Microsoft's products.

It reminds me of idea that big companies talked about their potential Linux migrations simply to get big discounts from Microsoft. Though that strategy seemed to work for Microsoft, this time I'm not so sure.

I'm not necessarily saying you're wrong, but supposedly MS gets $5 for every Android HTC sells... http://www.businessinsider.com/htc-pays-microsoft-5-per-andr...

Site here says that in 2010 HTC was selling Androids at a rate of around 18 million per year... http://www.fool.com/investing/high-growth/2010/05/27/deciphe...

So that means around $90 million in income for MS, for which they did basically nothing, pure profit.

On the other hand, $90 million just isn't that much when you're MS. Even if they had a similar deal for all Androids (which they don't AFAIK), it would still only be $180 million, less whatever they gave up to get those deals done.

So MS does seem to be making money on Android, but the amount is clearly dwarfed by their other businesses.

I don't think Microsoft profits much from their Android extortion racket. It exists mostly to generate FUD around Android and Linux and thus to protect their Windows cash-cow.