Microsoft has announced details of the next release of its Windows Phone platform, codenamed Mango, which Nokia separately said will be the version of the platform used in its first device powered by the OS. The US computing giant also announced that it has added Acer, Fujitsu and ZTE to its device vendor partner list. According to Microsoft, the release, which will be available free to existing Windows Phone customers and included on new phones later this year, delivers “more than 500” new features, which it claims “push the boundaries of the smartphone experience around communications, apps and the internet.” Support for 15 more languages has also been added, including Chinese, which will “greatly expand the list of countries where consumers have access to apps via Windows Phone Marketplace.” No details were announced of future smartphones from the new partners (including Nokia), other than they will be available “in markets around the world.”

According to Microsoft, Mango organises communications around the person or group, rather than by specific apps. For example, users can switch between text, Facebook chat and Windows Live Messenger within the same conversation. The company also highlighted deeper integration with Twitter and LinkedIn, as well as built-in Facebook check-ins. The platform also adds support for multitasking, enabling apps to run in the background, and improved Live Tiles, to provide customers with real-time information from apps without the need to open them. Finally, the company trumpeted enhanced internet capabilities, including support for the new Internet Explorer 9 browser with HTML5 support and hardware acceleration (pictured), and Bing integration. In terms of apps, Microsoft said that more than 17,000 products are now available from its Windows Phone Marketplace, eight months after the platform was first launched.