The latest numbers are in. Windows Phone is dropping. Microsoft Lumia sales are down 54%, and the worldwide market share has dipped under 3%.

Against a duopoly of iOS and Android, who each hold roughly 20% and 80% of the market, respectively, it certainly looks as if Windows Phone is a failed operating system that isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

But how about we take a fresh look at the current status of Windows Phone? As you probably know, Microsoft/Nokia Lumia devices comprise around 95% of all Windows Phones. Other small companies, such as BLU, have made their mark, but for all intents and purposes, a Lumia is synonymous with a Windows Phone.

With this in mind, we should look at the market share of smartphone makers rather than operating systems. Here Microsoft’s share looks rather respectable; 3% puts it in the top 15 smartphone makers. For some perspective, Lenovo (including Motorola) command only around 5% of the market share according to IDC. Now Microsoft Lumia looks pretty good, right?

To make matters more interesting, we should mention recent reports of the amount of forked Android devices there are. These forked devices cannot access Google Play services, and consequently, the Play store, without being manually rooted by the user. According to the Motley Fool, 29% of all Android devices were running forked versions of Android in the last quarter of 2014, and that number has only grown as forked smartphone makers, such as Xiaomi, and forked ROMs of Android, such as Cyanogen(Mod), become wildly popular. That means that Android’s 82% worldwide market share means almost nothing when it comes to the potential amount of customers accessing the Google Play store. It means only about 58% of all smartphone users can actually access the Google Play store, meaning the rather small Windows Phone user base (potential app customers) isn’t as comparatively small to Android as previously thought.

We can also not forget Microsoft’s inherited success in the feature/dumb phone market. Gartner reported that Microsoft commanded 7.2% of all mobile phone market share in the first quarter of 2015, making them the 3rd largest cell phone vendor on the planet. While this number will most likely continue to lessen with the inevitable decline in the popularity of feature phones, Microsoft may leverage this hold even more in the future. I’ll be writing an article next week about how they may do this.

While Windows Phone as an operating system isn’t doing the hottest, we must remember to look at its status from all perspectives. As a platform, Windows Phone (soon-to-be Windows 10 Mobile) isn’t doing too hot, but Microsoft’s hardware division still holds some mobile clout. And I think their strategy is a little bit different than what many of us have though. Microsoft will neither push Lumia harder nor back down from Lumia. Rather, they will most likely continue the course with Lumia while partnering with Windows PC OEMs, like LG, Acer, and Samsung, and maybe even mobile-only hardware makers, such as HTC (who isn’t doing too hot right now, either), and expand the Windows Mobile platform mainly through them.

While Microsoft announced they were slimming their phone portfolio, it has no real correlation to the actual sales of the devices. We can all agree that releasing 7 low-end phones in a single year is a bit much, for any smartphone maker, and that strategy has probably only hurt Windows Phone. Having a well-balanced portfolio of around 6 phones a year (possibly including a Surface Phone?) is the best option for Microsoft, and will most likely boost sales of their phones.

This is a slightly different strategy than we’ve seen before from Microsoft concerning mobile, and it will be extremely interesting to see whether OEMs and consumers finally give Microsoft’s mobile platform the attention it deserves.