While we are still waiting for the first Zune to launch the market, our friends across the pond have enjoyed numerous repetitions of Microsoft’s answer to the iPod including the current Zune HD generation that has been met with critical acclaim. Sporting a 3.3 inch touchscreen display, intuitive user interface and either 16GB or 32GB internal memory, the Zune HD is a viable alternative to Apple’s revolutionary personal music player. And now, the Zune HD is ready to make the same leap from music player to mobile phone if comments made by a Microsoft employee are to be believed. In response to a question about how Zune is part of Microsoft’s mobile strategy, Bach said:

“Now, your other question was about I’m getting old. Zune, so Zune has been critically successful. And the way Zune is going to be successful for us in the future is you should think of that as our media service across multiple screens. We’ll continue to have the Zune device screen. But, we now have Zune on Xbox. We have Zune on the PC. There are other places where Zune logically could go that we don’t get to talk about yet. And I think lots of different screens with that capability can go.”

If you read between the lines there, it certainly sounds like Robbie’s got his eyes on the prize — but if the Zune will come with Windows Mobile or live as their own brand, remains to be seen. No guarantees, but we are hope that all will be revealed at MWC next month.

Microsoft announced to reporters that Google will face a series of Zune like problems with its Nexus One as it tries to balance its Android platform.

“Doing both in the way they are trying to do both is really very, very difficult,” said Bach. “Google’s announcement sends a signal where they are going to place their commitment. That will create some opportunities for us and we will pursue them.”Speaking at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Microsoft’s Robbie Bach, president of the company’s Entertainment & Devices Division, told Bloomberg that he expected that Google’s foray into directly selling and marking the phone could scare away other Android licensees.

Bach presided over Microsoft’s own “PlaysForSure” Windows Media strategy for delivering a licensed software platform that hardware manufacturers could use to create MP3 players, competing with Apple’s iPod. When that program failed to gain much traction, Microsoft has taken matters into its own hands by announcing a plan to deliver a trademark of Microsoft Media player under the Zune brand.

The company insisted that the Zune would only compete against Apple’s iPod, leaving PlaysForSure licensees to continue their growth in parallel. However, as was the case, obviously, at the moment, the Zune only managed to kill off PlaysForSure devices and assume their small portion of the overall MP3 market without making any progress on the territory of Apple.

Whatever the path Microsoft had taken its Windows Media platform appeared headed for disaster. Without the Zune, the company would be dealing with the same type of problems that it faces in smartphones, where it has (so far) avoided releasing its own branded phone in deference to its Windows Mobile licensees, mainly HTC.

But that alternative strategy has not stopped Microsoft’s phone platform from quickly sliding into irrelevance in terms of actual sales, consumer mindshare nor attention of developers. Consumer products benefit from tight integration to a greater degree than PCs, where Microsoft has successfully ruled the roost as the world’s dominant PC supplier system provider.