14 DAY TRIAL // The Surface Phone dream has more or less come true with the unveiling of the Surface Duo, and while Microsoft insists this isn’t necessarily a smartphone, the Android operating system and phone capabilities convinced many it’s finally the time to look beyond the iPhone, at least in the enterprise.
Surface Duo won’t hit the shelves anytime soon, as Microsoft used the October 2 Surface event only to announce the device, not to actually bring it to the market. And at a recent event at a Microsoft Store, Panos Panay, chief product officer at Microsoft, explains that going for this approach was a very difficult decision.
“The conversation ‘how do we announce a new product that’s not available for another year’ was a big debate for us. I’d never launched a product early before - although we didn’t launch it, we announced it. That was emotional. Sharing what we were working on early…was challenging. Having those conversations,” he is quoted as saying by Pocket-Lint.
Microsoft says the Surface Duo isn’t a device that happened overnight, and Panay explains that the company has been working on this project for several years already.
And this makes sense. Rumors of a Surface Phone made the rounds many years ago, most likely based on the initial work that Microsoft did on the device. However, the plan changed frequently, evolving from a typical smartphone called Surface Phone to a dual-screen device that eventually turned out to be Surface Neo.
No Surface smartwatch
In reality, however, Surface Duo has more or less remained a secret project that nobody heard about until Panos Panay himself announced it on October 2.
“We think we have something here that’s the start of new category…they have been in development for years and getting them in developers' hands. I think they’re new products, I don’t think they’re replacement products. Some people will move from laptops for sure. The key thing now is to [get them out there],” Panay says.
At this point, Microsoft has a Surface device for everyone, he continues, especially as it’s now back in the mobile business.
And while the Surface Duo does help Microsoft expand its Surface offering, one product category that Microsoft is yet to tackle is wearables, as the company is yet to release a new smartwatch that would compete against the likes of Apple Watch.