“I think it is much to-do about nothing,” Sprint VP Fared Adib told AllThingsD in an interview on Tuesday. Customers sign up for two-year contracts, Adib said, and it makes sense for customers who want to have the latest technology get a device that will meet their needs throughout that time. People should be more concerned if Sprint weren’t doing that, he said.

“We’ve done this before,” he said. “So has every other carrier.”

Adib noted that Sprint’s LTE deployment, which will start with a few cities around midyear, will be faster than the rollout of prior technologies, including its 2G, 3G and WiMax networks.

Speaking of WiMax, Sprint may not be introducing new phones for its flagship brand, but it is now extending that technology to its Boost Mobile and Virgin Mobile prepaid services. Virgin and Boost both announced plans to start selling a WiMax device from HTC. (Virgin has a variant of the Evo 3D, while Boost will sell a phone similar to the traditional Evo 4G.)

The company has said it plans to continue offering WiMax service through at least 2015.

Also on Tuesday, Sprint announced a new bundle of family safety and security applications under the Sprint Guardian banner. The effort consists of a $10 per month service from Location Labs’ Safely unit and a $5 per month security service from Lookout.

Both services cover up to five devices, which could be a savings for families that have a bunch of Sprint phones.

Adding such services can help increase loyalty to Sprint among families with multiple devices — already a traditionally loyal group and a key source of revenue for all the major carriers.

“You might change phones and plans but you don’t change carriers,” Adib said of those customers.

One area where Sprint hasn’t been all that aggressive is in introducing devices running Microsoft’s Windows Phone operating system. Adib said that Sprint certainly took note of the slow initial sales globally for the first crop of Windows Phones.

Still, Adib said that the company is a longtime partner of Microsoft’s and expects to offer future Windows Phones, likely after the debut of Windows Phone 8.

“I don’t want to give you any specific dates,” he said.

But he said he is “very bullish” on Windows Phone overall and said the company has rapidly closed some of the gaps it had in terms of performance and capabilities. Adib said he has also been pleased to see the work Nokia has done in reintroducing itself in the U.S. with its first Lumia devices.

“I think we are going to continue to see that,” he said.

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In town for the annual CTIA trade show, the mood shifted back to business on Monday, at least until the evening parties kick off. The U.S. cellular trade association moved the convention from March to May (and to a party town) in hopes that the event can avoid being lost in the shadows of Mobile World Congress and the Consumer Electronics Show.

Although the main part of the show doesn’t begin until Tuesday, the first bits of product news were announced this morning. Verizon debuted the HTC Droid Incredible 4G LTE, while AT&T announced a $49 Samsung LTE Windows Phone as well as its plans to enter the home security business. This afternoon, MasterCard announced its new PayPass digital wallet.

AT&T is planning a press event later on Monday, with further news expected.

RELATED POSTS:

• With No Apple or Amazon at CTIA, iPad Rivals Free to Sling Arrows
• Sprint, Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile CEOs Square Off in New Orleans
• Remember Carrier IQ? Well, It’s Still Around and Kicking.
• Sprint Product Exec: Launching LTE Devices Before Network Just Makes Sense
• FCC Chairman: Rejection of AT&T’s T-Mobile Deal Isn’t Causing Higher Prices
• Boingo Adds VPN and Crowdsource Hotspot Data to Its Wi-Fi Software
• T-Mobile CTO: Network Should be Ready for iPhone Users by Q4
• Interview: AT&T’s Glenn Lurie on Being the New Sheriff in Town
• Another Day, Another PayPal-esque Digital Wallet: Here’s MasterCard’s High-Tech Billfold
• CTIA Gets Down to Business in the Big Easy
• AT&T Aims to Break Into the Home-Security Business
• Interview: CTIA Boss Steve Largent Aims To Keep Conference From Being Lost in the Shuffle

Of the four major U.S. wireless providers, AT&T offers the biggest selection of Windows Phone handsets, and its collection continues to grow with today’s introduction of the Samsung Focus 2.

It’s the fourth model in Samsung’s Focus series (following the original Flash, the Focus S and Focus Flash) and features a four-inch Super AMOLED touchscreen, a five-megapixel camera with 720p HD video-recording capabilities and a front-facing camera for video calls.

The Windows Phone 7.5 smartphone is also 4G LTE ready.

However, the most attractive aspect of the handset might be its affordable price tag: $49.99 with a two-year contract.

Of course, at that price, there are some trade-offs — such as a smaller screen and camera — when compared to some of the more expensive models, including the $99.99 Nokia Lumia 900 and the $199.99 HTC Titan II. Still, not everyone needs all the bells and whistles, and the Focus 2 looks to be a nice entry point for first-time smartphone buyers and those on a budget.

The Samsung Focus 2 is set for release on May 20, and comes only in white.

According to Nielsen, ethnic minorities were highly likely to have a smartphone, with Asian Americans leading the way at 67.3 percent opting for smartphones. Nearly three in five Hispanic mobile subscribers use a smartphone as do a majority fo African-American phone users.

By contrast, only 44.7 percent of white mobile phone subscribers have a smartphone.

Women were slightly more likely than men to have a smartphone, with 50.9 percent of women having a smartphone compared to 50.1 percent of men.

As for which smartphone people are using, recent trends continue as Android is the most commonly used operating system, running on 48.5 percent of smartphones, while the iPhone is the most commonly used smartphone model, at 32 percent of devices. RIM’s share of the U.S. smartphone market is down to 11.6 percent. Microsoft made up 5.8 percent of smartphone users in the U.S, but the old Windows Mobile accounted for more than twice as much of that than did Windows Phone 7 devices.

Filed by Robert Chmielinski, the suit alleges Nokia misled investors by promising that its transition to Microsoft Windows Phone platform would reinvigorate its flagging smartphone sales.

“Defendants told investors that Nokia’s conversion to a Windows platform would halt its deteriorating position in the smartphone market. It did not,” the lawsuit states. “This became apparent on April 11, 2012, when Nokia disclosed that its first quarter performance would be worse than expected. Nokia expected its first quarter 2012 non-IFRS Devices & Services operating margin to fall by 3%, and projected first quarter 2012 Devices & Services net sales of €4.2 billion.”

The lawsuit further alleges that Nokia fumbled the launch of the Lumia 900, shipping it with a glitch that ultimately forced it to offer customers an automatic $100 refund, “making the phone essentially free.”

Which is true, of course. But how ironic is it that a shareholder outraged over the slow pace of Nokia’s nascent transition to Windows Phone is suing the company, a move that will arguably further slow that pace by distracting management and drain away further resources?

And c’mon: the Lumia line isn’t even a year old yet. It debuted in Europe last November.

Asinine.

Robbins Geller, the law firm representing Chmielinski, says it seeks to recover damages on behalf of all purchasers of Nokia’s shares.

Nokia, for its part, says it will defend itself against the suit, whose allegations it believes to be “without merit.”

India and Russia will be among the first markets to get the PureView, Nokia said. The company also said it was extending its exclusive camera deal with Germany’s Carl Zeiss, its longtime imaging partner, whose lenses power the PureView and the N8.

“We are getting much more than just the optics components from Carl Zeiss,” said Nokia head of imaging Juha Alakarhu, in a telephone interview. “This is really a true partnership with Carl Zeiss. They have a big role throughout the development of our cameras.”

Nokia is counting on imaging to remain as one of its selling points as it shifts its weight from its homegrown Symbian operating system to building phones based on Microsoft’s Windows Phone software. Nokia reiterated that it plans to adapt the PureView technology to future Windows Phones.

The company still isn’t going into any details on that front, nor is it saying when the first Windows Phones with the technology will ship. Nokia plans to sell the Symbian-based PureView in markets beyond Russia and India, but has said it does not plan to bring it to the U.S.

“We will bring PureView to future smartphones — all the parts in the product, from great optics [to the] processing, the whole experience,” Alakarhu said.

During a visit to Finland in February, AllThingsD was among the first outsiders to see the PureView, ahead of the formal launch of the device at that month’s Mobile World Congress.

Since then, Alakarhu said he has been traveling a lot with the phone, taking it on various work trips, including a recent visit to Indonesia, and this week’s May 1 celebrations in Finland. Alakarhu said he gets lots of amazed reactions, adding that he is probably most pleased that his usually critical photography enthusiast friends are impressed.

“I was able to show the photos, and I was happy to see their happy faces,” he said.

Nokia has also promised it has more photo tricks up its sleeve, though Alakarhu wouldn’t spill the beans.

“I probably shouldn’t say anything about our future surprises,” he said. “We are working hard on imaging technology.”

Nokia spent five years developing the camera technology behind the PureView.

Responding to a report in the Korea Herald that suggested it was “taking a step back from Windows Phones,” LG today said that is an inaccurate characterization.

“At the moment, LG is primarily focusing on developing Android-equipped smartphones,” the company said in a statement. “Contrary to what some articles have said, LG is not giving up on Windows Phones.”

But it’s not exactly throwing its full support behind them, either. There isn’t a single Windows Phone device on the company’s near-term handset roadmap, as the company itself concedes.

“Although we currently don’t have a new Windows device in the pipeline, that is simply because demand for Android devices is so strong,” LG said in a statement to AllThingsD. “We’ve maintained since the beginning that LG will support whatever operating system consumers want but at the moment, our priority is to get our Android devices to a level where we feel we have strong coverage of all the major markets.”

So no, LG is not giving up on Windows Phone. But its commitment to the platform wasn’t all that big in the first place. While it was one of the first hardware makers to support the platform, the company has released only a handful of handsets running the OS.

With the move, Microsoft’s Internet calling service is now no longer as much of a second-class citizen on Microsoft’s own devices.

Microsoft completed its $8.5 billion purchase of Skype last October, but until this February’s Mobile World Congress there wasn’t even a beta version of the software for Windows Phone.

As of Sunday, Skype for Windows Phone has earned the official 1.0 moniker.

That doesn’t mean that the software is necessarily on par with its Android and iPhone counterparts, however. A key limitation, as noted by the Verge, is that Skype can’t run in the background. So you can’t stay on a call — or even receive one — unless Skype is the application in the foreground of the phone.

It seems as though there is another report every day or two on which smartphone platform is gaining or losing share.

But, for those who just can’t get enough of that sort of thing, Web-tracking firm Chitika now has a site that offers a practically constant glance at such data.

Chitika’s data looks not at sales, though, but at share of Web pages being viewed. As a result, it is good for showing active use of various smartphone operating systems, but not for tracking phone sales.

Its new Web site looks at the 24 preceding hours of U.S. mobile Web use (on a six-hour delay).

As of Friday afternoon, for example, iOS had accounted for 68.16 percent of the past day’s U.S. mobile traffic, while Android made up 27.32 percent and all other operating systems accounted for just 4.52 percent.

It should be noted those figures also include tablets running iOS and Android, so the iPad’s dominance is giving Apple a boost.

Posting financials after market close Thursday, the company reported a fiscal third-quarter profit of $5.11 billion, or 60 cents a share, on $17.41 billion in revenue.

Analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial, on average, had expected the company to report revenue of $17.18 billion — up 4.6 percent from a year ago.

Driving the beat: The majority of Microsoft’s various divisions, which all posted revenue increases, save one. Strong Windows 7 adoption allowed the company’s Windows and Windows Live Division to post revenue of $4.62 billion, a 4 percent increase over the year prior. Its Server & Tools business posted $4.57 billion in third-quarter revenue, a 14 percent increase from the year prior. Revenues were up 9 percent at Microsoft’s Business Division which reported $5.81 billion in revenue. And they were up 6 percent at Online Services, which posted $707 million in revenue.

That leaves Entertainment & Devices, which was the big loser this quarter. It posted revenue of $1.62 billion, a decrease of 16 percent. Evidently, some of the shine is starting to come off the Kinect.

Microsoft is revising operating expense guidance downward and now offers a range of $28.3 billion to $28.7 billion for the full year ending June 30, 2012. Microsoft also offers preliminary fiscal year 2013 operating expense guidance of $30.3 billion to $30.9 billion, representing 6 percent to 8 percent growth from the midpoint of fiscal year 2012 guidance.

During Verizon’s first-quarter earnings call Thursday, CFO Fran Shammo voiced the carrier’s support for Microsoft’s mobile OS, saying it’s “hoping to do the same thing” with Windows Phone that it did with Android.

“It is important that there is a third ecosystem brought into the mix here,” Shammo said. “We are fully supportive of that with Microsoft. … We helped create the Android platform from the beginning and it is an incredible platform today, and we are looking to do the same thing with a third ecosystem.”

Which is interesting to hear, because that certainly doesn’t appear to have been Verizon’s intent to date. Currently, the carrier has only one Windows Phone in its portfolio — the HTC Trophy, and it’s an older model. So for Shammo to suddenly announce that it’s going to back Windows Phone the way it backed Android suggests Verizon has finally dispensed with the wait-and-see approach it had taken with the platform.

The question now: What Windows Phone devices will the carrier add to its portfolio? Shammo didn’t say, but there’s at least one easy guess: One of Nokia’s Lumia devices.

Looks like the software glitch that plagued early versions of the handset — and prompted Nokia to offer replacement devices to consumers affected by it — hasn’t had much of an effect on inventory. The company says that far more consumers have opted to patch their Lumias with the software Nokia has provided than have swapped them for new ones at a local AT&T store.

In other words, if the cyan version of the Lumia 900 is out of stock at AT&T’s online store (as it currently is), it’s because it’s sold out for the time being, not because Nokia is scrambling to update and recertify returned handsets.

“The inventory situation is primarily a function of demand because we are seeing that most customers are opting to keep their units and simply update via Zune,” Nokia spokeswoman Karen Lachtanski told AllThingsD. “So the impact of customer swaps is insignificant. We are producing more devices to satisfy demand as quickly as possible.”

That’s a good sign, indeed. And further evidence that sales are exceeding expectations, as Paul Roth, AT&T’s president of retail sales and service, recently claimed.

Evidently, the company has no plans to sell — not at this time, anyway.

No, RIM is looking for an investment bank to help it license its smartphone software or broker a strategic outside investment in the company.

An inevitable move, as the company conducts CEO Thorsten Heins’s “comprehensive review of strategic opportunities,” though it does sound like a bit of a dead end. After all, who could possibly be interested in licensing RIM’s BlackBerry platform, particularly the as-of-yet unreleased and unproven BlackBerry 10? Nokia has cast its lot with Microsoft’s Windows Phone OS. And Motorola, Samsung and HTC have all cast theirs with Google’s Android OS. Both platforms have broader and stronger app ecosystems than RIM’s.

So, again, who could possibly be interested in licensing an unproven fourth BlackBerry OS with an inferior ecosystem?

The credit firm cut long-term and short-term debt ratings by one notch. Moody’s also said its outlook was negative, meaning further downgrades are possible.

“While volatility by quarters is not uncommon, Moody’s believes that the structural challenges facing Nokia’s Mobile Phones segment may not be easy to address, such as the market share gains recorded by makers of very low-end phones or new phone promotions by Chinese carriers,” Moody’s said in a statement. “This precipitous decline is of particular concern considering that Nokia’s Mobile Phones segment was still the core income generator for the Nokia group in 2011, when it contributed 1.5 billion Euros to the group’s operating profit of 1.8 billion Euros.”

Moody’s also noted that the company’s shift from Symbian to Windows Phone-based devices “is proving more challenging than expected given that sales of Symbian-based devices are falling off very quickly while Lumia sales are only ramping up slowly.”

The ratings move follows Nokia’s warning last week that its business was weaker than expected and that it sees another rough quarter ahead. Nokia is slated to deliver its full earnings report on Thursday.

For its part, Nokia said it is “quickly taking action” to address concerns about its business.

“Nokia will continue to increase its focus on lowering the company’s cost structure, improving cash flow and maintaining a strong financial position,” CFO Timo Ihamuotil said in a statement.

Nokia was hit with downgrades last year after announcing its plans to focus on Windows Phone.

Moody’s did note that Nokia “has maintained a strong liquidity position and capital structure” and had about twice as much cash and marketable securities as it did debt as of the end of March.

Indeed, it appears that the device is selling so well that it’s tough to even find one right now. AT&T’s online store lists both versions of the device — cyan and black — as temporarily out of stock. At Amazon Wireless, the cyan version is back-ordered. And four of the five AT&T stores I called told me they had run out of stock.

Which is good news and bad for the Nokia, AT&T and Microsoft triumvirate — if the stock-outs are demand-related.

Good news in that the Lumia 900, the most eagerly anticipated Windows Phone device to date, is off to a good start, despite an unfortunate software glitch that prevented Internet access for some early customers. Bad news in that Nokia and AT&T don’t seem to have a supply sufficient enough to put a 900 in the hands of everyone who would like one.

There are a few caveats to this, however. It’s possible that these stock-outs may not be demand-related. They could, for example, be caused by Nokia’s offer of replacement handsets to consumers whose Lumia 900s were affected by that software glitch I mentioned earlier. While it’s likely that most of those consumers opted for a downloadable fix for the issue, it’s also conceivable that a number of them might have swapped their devices for new ones at a local AT&T store. And that clearly would have an effect on inventory.

Another possible reason for these inventory issues: AT&T’s Lumia 900 stock might have been depleted if it returned handsets potentially affected by the software glitch to Nokia for updating and recertification. Though I have no insight into it, I imagine that process would take some time. And it would likely have inventory implications for AT&T’s online store, and its local outlets as well.

AT&T and Nokia both declined comment on the issue.

The Finnish phone maker reiterated that customers can either download and install the patch or exchange their phone at an AT&T store. Nokia had originally said to expect the software update to be ready by Monday.

“Consumers now have the opportunity to update their AT&T version Nokia Lumia 900 software through Zune and Windows Phone 7 Connector for Mac earlier than anticipated,” Nokia said in a statement.

All Lumia 900 customers, regardless of whether they have had problems, will get a $100 credit, Nokia U.S. head Chris Weber told AllThingsD earlier this week. Customers that buy or order a Lumia 900 before midnight PT on April 21 will also get the credit.

That effectively makes the device free, for now, since AT&T had been selling it for $99 with a new two-year contract.

Nokia has gotten plaudits for its prompt and generous dealing with the issues. However, the glitches still threaten to diminish the launch of a product seen as key to the ambitions of Nokia and Microsoft to take on the top smartphones and re-establish themselves as serious players in the U.S. market.

The issue was particularly unfortunate given the teaser campaign that Nokia had run, touting that the arrival of the Lumia 900 meant that “the Smartphone Beta Test was over.”

The company said it expected negative margins of 2 to 3 percent for its devices and services business, as compared to its earlier expectation of roughly break-even results.

“Our disappointing Devices & Services first quarter 2012 financial results and outlook for the second quarter 2012 illustrates that our Devices & Services business continues to be in the midst of transition,” CEO Stephen Elop said in a statement.

Nokia cautioned that it will take “tactical price actions” in its low-end phone business, and also warned that further painful moves could be on the horizon.

The Finnish company said it “will accelerate planned cost reductions and will pursue additional significant structural actions if and when necessary.”

“We are continuing to increase the clock speed of the company,” Elop said. “The change is tangible, and we are proud of the way Nokia employees are quickly responding to the needs of consumers and partners.”

Elop tried to paint as good a picture as possible of things.

“Within our Smart Devices business unit, we have established early momentum with Lumia, and we are increasing our investments in Lumia to achieve market success,” Elop said. “Our operator and distributor partners are providing solid support for Windows Phone as a third ecosystem, as evidenced most recently by the launch of the Lumia 900 by AT&T in the United States.”

Of course, even there, things have been bumpy. Nokia confirmed late Tuesday that a software glitch is causing some Lumia 900 customers to be unable to connect to the Internet. The company is rushing out a software fix and offering a $100 credit to all early Lumia 900 buyers.

Nokia said that it sold more than two million of its Lumia phones in the first quarter, at an average selling price of 220 euros. It added that the number of Lumia phones being activated has continued to grow each month, although that’s probably to be expected as the company brings its Windows Phone products to more markets.

As flagship product launches go, the Lumia 900’s was more unusual than most. Certainly, the decision to launch the handset on Easter Sunday was perplexing. But more confounding still was the manner in which it was carried out, which really doesn’t speak well of Nokia or its carrier partner AT&T, which in late March was hyping the Lumia 900′s launch as its biggest ever — and that includes the iPhone’s debut.

“At all levels, this is a notch above anything we’ve ever done,” AT&T device head Jeff Bradley said at the time. “Before you walk in to the store, you know this is our hero phone.”

Sounded great in theory. But what did it mean in practice?

Well, in practice it meant that consumers missed out on that hero-phone messaging, because there weren’t too many AT&T stores for them to walk into. Most were closed for the holiday, a detail revealed on an outgoing voicemail message that included no mention whatsoever of the Lumia, but a nice little plug for one of its main rivals:

“Visit our store to see the exciting iPhone 4S, and how only AT&T’s network lets your iPhone 4S download three times faster.”

An unfortunate oversight. And I was far from the only person to notice. Barclays analyst Raimo Lenschow picked up on it as well, along with a few other details suggesting Nokia and AT&T’s execution left a lot to be desired.

“Our admittedly anecdotal check of 10-15 stores did not find a single one that was open — a significant barrier to sales,” Lenschow said. “We found promotional materials for the Lumia — banners, display cases, etc. — unevenly prepared during our window shopping. The promotional messages on the answering services for the stores was in fact for the iPhone.”

More disturbing still was the lack of coordination Lenschow found at AT&T’s national sales office. “Several of the national representatives were unaware of the launch,” the analyst said. “Several were in fact unaware of the device itself.”

And then there was that Nokia-sponsored Nicki Minaj concert in Times Square. That seems to have gone over well (see video embed below), but more for Minaj than Nokia. Can’t imagine that stunt sold many Lumia 900s.

So, as I said, a perplexing and at times poorly orchestrated launch. Though it doesn’t seem to have had any ill effect on sales. The Lumia 900 has already risen to the top of Amazon’s Best Sellers list for Cell Phones With Service Plans, and AT&T seems quite happy with sales so far.

“The Lumia has gotten great reviews and we have been taking preorders online and in our stores for a week,” AT&T spokesman Mark Siegel told AllThingsD. “We are well off to the races.”

(Image courtesy of Flickr/NokiaOfficial)

Other times, products experience moderate or even sluggish first-day sales.

Rarely, though, does a product hit the market on a day when stores are largely closed.

That, however, was the case for the Nokia Lumia 900, which launched on Easter Sunday.

As a result, many of the AT&T and Microsoft stores that carry the device were actually shuttered for the first official day of sales. The product did indeed go on sale on Sunday, though — at least at those stores that were open.

No real reason was given for the unusual timing. One side benefit, though, is that little can be made of the initial sales, giving the device some time to live up to the high expectations placed on it by AT&T, Microsoft and Nokia.

The product is especially key for Microsoft and Nokia, both of which have pegged their rebirth in the smartphone market to the success of the new Lumia. The companies are investing heavily in marketing the product, along with getting it to market at an attractive price.

The phone, which aims to compete in the high end of the market, is priced at $99 with a new contract, and can be had for even less from some online sellers.

Last fall, Microsoft aggressively recruited Mr. Weingarten to convince him to build his nutrition app Fooducate for its Windows Phone. Microsoft proposed putting a Fooducate engineer in Tel Aviv through a weeklong boot camp, and offered a new Windows-based Nokia phone for software testing.

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But that doesn’t mean the phone can’t make an appearance or two. Speaking at the VentureBeat Mobile Summit in Sausalito on Tuesday, Nokia’s Hans-Peter Brondmo demoed the Symbian-powered device and its impressive picture-taking abilities.

Brondmo showed off a few pictures he has taken, including one of the San Francisco Bay Area, one from a ski trip and another, taken from a plane, of Greenland. In each case, Brondmo said he was able to later focus on things he didn’t even know were in the picture.

“You can really change the nature of photography,” Brondmo said.

Of more relevance to the crowd, Brondmo also showed off the Lumia 900, a high-end Windows Phone which goes on sale from AT&T in the coming days, for $99.

Brondmo also made reference to the attendees, who earlier were divided into Android and iOS camps during a discussion on the mobile-platform wars.

“Are we still Android and iOS, or is this the Windows Phone crowd?” Brondmo said, noting that he hadn’t picked either market share leader during that debate. “I was in the middle of the room, by the way, standing in the back, jumping up and down.”

As for that Windows Phone effort, Brondmo noted that there are now 70,000 apps for Microsoft’s operating system.

“The app ecosystem is voting with their feet,” Brondmo said. “Of course, we are supporting them as well.”

Next year, Brondmo joked, the conference will have to be split into three — a big one for Windows Phone and two smaller ones for Android and iOS.

“We’ll see,” said onstage interviewer Devindra Hardawar.