Yesterday Microsoft launched their latest update for smartphone OS - the Windows Mobile 6.1. Windows Mobile 6.1 will be available to mobile phone partners in the 3rd quarter of 2008, with the first Windows Mobile phones using the update to be available by the end of 2008. Like most mobile phone hardware and software makers, Microsoft won’t admit that this latest update is inspired by iPhone. The list of new features though, is a definite indication of the motivation provided by the iPhone. We can divide the new features in Windows Mobile 6.1 into five groups. The first group is Ease of Use, Windows Mobile is not known for its user friendliness and Microsoft is trying to change that with the 6.1 update. They have added a Getting Started Center and Sliding Panel Home Screen for easy access to setup process, notifications and most used features. The XPERIA panels on the Sony’s upcoming XPERIA phone that looks like a direct rip off from iPhone is a good example of the ease of use group. The second group is Mobile Messaging; the features added are Threaded Text Messaging and Easy E-mail Setup. The threaded text messaging is same as the SMS on an iPhone or any online chat program. The Easy E-mail setup is aiming to be as easy as Mail account setup on the iPhone where you just provide the name, E-mail address and password to setup your E-mail account on phone. You don’t have to worry about incoming or outgoing mail servers, server port and SSL settings. The third set of features are related to web browser and it’s a fact that iPhone is the king of mobile web browsing. Like the iPhone Microsoft has added Page Overview and Zoom Support to mobile Internet Explorer, which is based on last generation Internet Explorer 6. The fourth group is multimedia, where Microsoft has added H.264 support, easy access to music stored on the device, play pause from home screen and viewing photos stored on device directly from home screen. Well, here again, Microsoft is following Apple’s lead, iPod on the iPhone is the best multimedia application ever done on a mobile phone. The last group is Platform Management where Microsoft rules. Microsoft System Center Mobile Device Manager 2008 will allow IT professionals to set and control policies in a single environment. Apple will be implementing these features in June with iPhone Update 2.0 but Apple will be using the help of Microsoft’s Active Directory and Exchange server. So the ultimate question - How does Windows Mobile 6.1 compare with the iPhone. In my opinion, Windows Mobile 6.1 is playing catch-up for most of the features implemented in iPhone last year. It’s true that iPhone also lacks few features like the copy/paste function and voice-activated dialing but it does have one thing that places the iPhone light-years ahead of its competition – it’s great user interface.