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The two companies have had a tie-up for years, with Nokia supporting Microsoft's Exchange for its smartphones, even though Nokia once tried to go the business email route on its own to only be bested by Blackberry and even Microsoft itself, but now Nokia has turned to Microsoft for salvation - instead of Google.
Personally, I had high hopes for Nokia's MeeGo OS and smartphones, thinking that MeeGo would be the go for Nokia to finally have a decent, modern-day OS of its own, even if Nokia did have to partner with Intel to make it happen.
However, although Nokia says it will still release a MeeGo based phone sometime this year, it's clear that Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 is the platform that Nokia is putting its smartphone faith in, while keeping Symbian around for the low-end budget phones that Nokia has generated all that volume with over the past few years.
Now, the two companies are promising to create a 'new global mobile ecosystem', but can two fallen, wounded warriors join-up Voltron style to defeat the twin robot rogues that are iOS and Android?
That's something that we'll have to wait and see on, with the first Nokia WinPho 7 yet to hit store shelves, in an era of ever more advanced Android OS phones, from LG's upcoming 3G-enabled smartphone to Sony's Android-powered PSP smartphone, right through to the smartphone that everyone wants to 'kill' - the iPhone, soon to be launched as the iPhone 5 - and perhaps in a rumoured new 'smaller' version, too.
Nokia's press release is interesting to read - it's laced with terms such as that they 'intend to jointly create market-leading mobile products and services designed to offer consumers, operators and developers unrivalled choice and opportunity'.
Wow'¦ sounds good'¦ but how long will we have to wait for the next Mokia WinPho 7 phone to appear? It had better arrive real soon, or no-one will care one whit.
Nokia and Microsoft also 'plan to work together to integrate key assets and create completely new service offerings, while extending established products and services to new markets', which also sounds fantastic, but it's all in the future, rather than right here, right now.
So, despite my negative-ish sounding sentiments, the two companies are still very powerful, they still have compelling technologies, and a Nokia/Microsoft tie-up certainly does help to throw a new cat into among the smartphone avians.
There's definitely a real chance that the two companies can actually create a true third force, and potentially have a heck of a lot more punch than HP with its WebOS.
After all, both Nokia and Microsoft are past masters at the smartphone game, and while HP has had a Windows Mobile powered smartphone or two in the past, can HP really defeat a re-invigorated Nokia and Microsoft with an OS, WinPho 7, that likely already has more users than WebOS can poke a stick at?
So'¦ what are Nokia and Microsoft promising to do and deliver with their new partnership? Please read on to page two for the details!!
