Bloomberg is estimating that sales of Nokia's first Windows Phones have topped a million so far -- a figure that analysts quoted in the story say looks promising if the momentum can be kept up.

Bloomberg calculates, based on an average of 22 analysts' estimates, that Nokia has sold about 1.3 million of its Lumia handsets globally between November -- when the handsets went on sale in Europe -- and the end of the year.

"The early shipment figures are important," Bloomberg reports, "because investors had doubted the alliance with Microsoft could compete with Apple's iPhone and devices running on Android, developed by Google Inc."

Both Nokia and Microsoft have a lot at stake in this partnership, announced last year, that has the Finnish phonemaker using Windows Phone as its main smartphone operating system. Both companies see the partnership as key in gaining share in the smartphone market. The first Nokia Windows Phone in the U.S. -- the Lumia 710 -- went on sale earlier this month and its high-end device -- the Lumia 900 -- is expected in the U.S. sometime in the next several months.

(Photo of Lumia 800 from Nokia)