What can Nokia do to WP7 that HTC & LG can’t?

So here’s a bit of intriguing question that been puzzling me for some time. Windows Phone 7 has been out in the local market for nearly 2 years now and it has not made a huge piece of the pie in terms of market share.

I’ve been using the HTC HD7 as early as December 2010 and I’ve actually used it extensively (it became my primary phone for about 6 months). It was running on Windows Phone 7 and it’s not even on 7.5 Mango yet.

Since then, both LG and Samsung had the chance to present their flagship WP7 handset. LG had the Optimus 7 and Samsung had Samsung Focus (although I could not remember if they released it locally).

HTC on the other hand went on to deliver several more WP7 handsets — HTC Trophy, HTC Mozart and recently, the HTC Radar.

However, since Nokia announced that it will be carrying WP7 in its high-end smartphones, the excitement and anticipation has considerably grown and I’m not exactly sure why.

Nevertheless, let me hazard a guess:

A. The promise that Nokia can bring down the retail prices of Windows Phone 7 handsets. WP7 phones used to retail in the Php25k and up making them go head to head with other flagship phones. It is possible customers are hoping that Nokia will provide the market with a wider selection and more affordable handset. My guess is that the sweet spot will be under Php20k.

B. Nokia’s reputation with designing eye-candy smartphones. Maybe people are just looking for great looking phones? This is pretty obvious with the Lumia series.

C. A combination of both — great handset design and great price — a formula that Nokia needs to deliver in order to translate all these excitement into actual sales.

If you guys have other ideas, please chime in the comments. In any case, let me know what your pick is from the choices above.