Microsoft's J Allard, Chief of Microsoft's Zune group, said that he'd "never say never" to a Microsoft-built mobile phone, according to Saul Hansell in his New York Times Blog on Friday.

"A cynic would describe Microsoft’s approach to the music player market as simple Apple envy.... So I've got to imagine that many in the inner sanctums of Redmond are hot to introduce a slick phone from Microsoft," Mr. Hansell wrote. So he put the question to Microsoft's J Allard, who was circumspect about the Apple iPhone.

"People are buying it because it’s an Apple phone, not because it’s an iPod. It’s a lousy iPod. You can’t skip a track without looking at it. You can’t go running with the thing. It is the first consumer product that has done browsing [on a cellphone] extremely well," Mr. Allard said. He added that the success of the iPhone is the result of Apple's "hangover from their relentless pursuit of building beautiful products for 25 years. That is their brand."

When asked about why the carriers have kept Microsoft from making good software for those phones in the past, Mr. Allard praised Apple. "In the past, the cellphone carrier was the final decision maker [about how phones were designed]. A cellphone operator is not best positioned to decide how to lay out a menu. I think the iPhone came out and showed people a great experience, and in some ways got everybody to check their ego at the door."

Finally, when asked about Microsoft's motives for introducing the Zune, Mr. Allard offered this: "We didn’t create the Zune because we were dying to get into the hardware business and take inventory risk. We felt we had to do it. It’s tough from a P&L [profit and loss] point of view. Windows was incredible. We got to create most of the magic and take none of the financial risk. History isn’t going to repeat that with consumer goods."