Microsoft invented their own troubles in this market. How many parallel mobility teams can one company reasonably sustain -

a) Windows phone 6.5

b) Windows phone 7.x

c) Windows phone 8.x

d) Project Pink / Kin

e) Danger

f) Windows 8 RT

g) Courier

To be fair, those teams were not parallel. 6.5 died with 7, which died with 8. Danger was a subsidiary, and they made Project Pink, so they're the same. Windows on ARM, yes, was a team, but not associated with Mobility. They're a Windows 8 team, not a Windows Phone team, so they're not actually competing with WP nor are they working on mobility-specific platforms. They simply deal with Windows on ARM processors. And finally, we don't know where the Courier team fit into the whole plan, since it was an incubation project.

Therefore, we get:

- Windows Phone

- Windows on ARM

- Danger/Pink

And then some Courier Team, probably a MS Research team (so not part of an actual commercial team) which I wouldn't count as a team.

Then, Danger was folded into Windows Phone, and Courier was killed off, leaving:

- Windows Phone

- Windows on ARM

PMX wasn't Danger, and PMX did Pink/Kin. Danger was folded into PMX, true, but the history is way messier than you're letting on. Some of the survivors of the PMX fiasco / power grab went on to Courier.

WoA did absorb some parts of WiMo (power management, for example).

The whole thing makes me want to cry in frustration. The day the iPhone was announced, the halls of 116-117-118-119 were filled with shell shocked, demoralized, pissed off people.

I was using whatever information is available publicly about the teams. Blame the internet for an oversimplification.

Sure thing. I thought you were a Microsoft insider for some reason, my error.