--FILE--Visitors try out Nokia smartphones installed with Microsoft's Windows Phone operating system during PT/EXPO COMM CHINA 2012 in Beijing, China, 18 September 2012. Despite the full-tilt promotion by Microsoft of the Windows phone, the software giant's mobile operating system appears to be on the brink of extinction. The US firm pinched a mere 0.4% of China's mobile phone market at 35 million units this year, a minuscule share amid the 1.3 billion units sold and down from 2.8% in 2013, according to QQ's tech portal. Over the past year, over 95% of phone brands worldwide, virtually everyone except Nokia, left WP products out of their present and future lineups. It is a collective disavowal of the Windows OS, said the report. Three years following the launch of its latest WP8, the Windows phone has stepped into virtual oblivion, yielding the global market to its two archrivals Android, the market leader with a projected 82.3% share this year, and Apple's iOS, according to statistics from International Data Corporation.
