Microsoft confirmed last night that it didn't offer the new Lumia 950 to any U.S. carrier except AT&T, cementing the idea that the company isn't particularly interested in selling its latest phones in the U.S.

I've been calling lots of people in the industry over the past few days, and I'm going to make some assertions that I can't give specific sources for, but trust me, they're well-informed. Let's start with Microsoft's official statement about its new flagship phone, which came out after T-Mobile CEO John Legere had a fit on Twitter, and said that his carrier "did not turn down the new Windows devices. MSFT gave to AT&T."

Here's the Microsoft statement, which I will annotate for you.

"We're refocusing our channel strategy, narrowing it in the short-term and planning for broader operator availability long-term," Microsoft says.

Microsoft's huge layoff round in July shrank the teams that were dealing with U.S. carriers and cut down on communications. This is all part of Satya Nadella and Panos Panay apparently trying to get rid of the Ballmer/Elop/Nokia threads in their mobile organization and start from scratch.

About Nokia, "Mr. Nadella is said to have disliked the acquisition originally," the New York Times says. And while Panay was relentlessly "pumped" about the Surface Book at Tuesday's launch event, he was more bashful about the phones. That's noteworthy because Panay is never less than hyperbolic about a product he actually believes in.

"While there was interest across the board from U.S. operators, currently we've made the decision to have AT&T carry the Lumia 950, and then sell both the Lumia 950 and Lumia 950 XL unlocked through our own channel in Microsoft stores," Microsoft's statement continues.

Several industry sources told me that the U.S. carriers have shown interest in Windows Phones and said, like Legere did, that Microsoft gave carriers the cold shoulder. In the case of Verizon and Sprint, Microsoft didn't show much interest in testing and validating the 950 series for their CDMA voice system, so that was a non-starter. (CDMA verification is expensive and takes time.) In the case of T-Mobile, well, you see what Legere said.

Even AT&T, Microsoft's one partner, isn't all that excited about these phones. There's a hierarchy of signalled carrier enthusiasm: executive appearance at the launch event, logo on a slide, well-timed press release, or late press release—and AT&T went with that last choice.

My sources say AT&T only picked up the phone because it's easy for AT&T to carry and Microsoft wanted some channel into large U.S. enterprise sales, where it will be focusing its efforts for the moment. AT&T does not intend to put much marketing behind these phones in the U.S.

Selling the phones unlocked is for fan and developer service; nobody expects any real volume there.

There's been an ongoing Twitter debate this morning between tech journalist Brian Sweet and T-Mobile senior product manager Desmond Smith where Sweet asserts that T-Mobile hasn't kept Windows Phones in stock and Smith put the blame on Microsoft, saying "poor marketing support, customer support & roadmap planning on the windows side of the house have hurt them."

My research sides with Smith here, especially with the sense that the new team at Microsoft just isn't that enthusiastic about the existing lineup of products.

Then again, as one observer I spoke to quipped, "20 percent of them will end up on T-Mobile anyway."

"In Europe, Deutsche Telekom will carry the Lumia 950 and Lumia 950 XL, and we'll have more to share about other carriers shortly."

Roger Cheng at CNET and Tom Warren at The Verge have speculated that the 950 and 950 XL are "placeholder" products for a rumored Surface Phone which Panay's team is working on, which will include features like PixelSense pressure-sensitivity. The 950 satisfies the withering, but still extant Nokia loyalists in Europe and Asia, and lets Microsoft get some Windows 10 phone products into the market so application developers can work on Continuum-compatible apps for the next generation of devices.

That very well may be the case, but if it's true, the Surface Phone is a long way out—possibly as late as the holidays next year. Panay only took control of the hardware division in late July, which means he's had three months to work on a new phone, and the typical development cycle (largely because of the grind of carrier relationships and wireless testing) takes about a year.

So even though the Lumia 950 may be an excellent phone—I look forward to reviewing it—this will almost certainly be another lost year for Windows Phone sales in the U.S. It's cold comfort to know that this may actually be Microsoft's plan.

Let me leave you with an ice-cold burn from T-Mobile's Smith: "I like Windows phone, but I don't think Microsoft does, otherwise they would treat it differently."

Further Reading

Mobile App Reviews