With the end of Windows on phones, how does Microsoft avoid being the next IBM?

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For fans of the platform, the official confirmation that Windows on phones isn’t under active development any longer—security bugs will be fixed, but new features and new hardware aren’t on the cards—isn’t a big surprise. This is merely a sad acknowledgement of what we already knew.

Last week, Microsoft also announced that it was getting out of the music business, signaling another small retreat from the consumer space. It’s tempting to shrug and dismiss each of these instances, pointing to Microsoft’s continued enterprise strength as evidence that the company’s position remains strong.

And certainly, sticking to the enterprise space is a thing that Microsoft could do. Become the next IBM: a stable, dull, multibillion dollar business. But IBM probably doesn’t want to be IBM right now—it has had five straight years of falling revenue amid declining relevance of its legacy businesses—and Microsoft probably shouldn’t want to be the next IBM, either.