14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft’s Surface Duo is now a thing after the company started taking pre-orders for the device with a September 10 shipping date.
Originally announced in late 2019 and supposed to go live in the holiday season of 2020, the Surface Duo arrives earlier than anticipated, and many believe it’s all because Microsoft just couldn’t hold it back for much longer due to the previous-generation hardware that’s used on it.
In other words, given the Surface Duo comes with a 2019 processor and lacks key features like NFC, Microsoft had to release it as much as possible to avoid the device becoming dead on arrival due to outdated hardware.
Regardless of the hardware that’s available on the Duo, it’s very important to look at this new product from a long-term perspective. Microsoft sees the Duo as a truly innovative product whose role is to reinvent mobile productivity.
While the Redmond-based software giant has made an obsession about productivity in the last few years, the Surface Duo has a much more ambitious goal: it wants to replace a computer completely.
“I’ve actually been using it as my main device. I’m not sure I need anything else!” Deepak Menon, lead designer for the Office app, explains.
So technically, the Surface Duo is the Android device that’s built to replace a PC, which is kind of awkward because it runs an operating system that’s built by Google.
In other words, after struggling to bring a PC on every desk and make Windows the number one operating system on the planet, now Microsoft wants people to stick with Android. To be clear, Microsoft does not want to kill off the PC but hopes its Surface Duo to be the device of choice in mobile-first countries.
What this means is that Microsoft wants to conquer the markets where customers don’t typically rely on a PC but stick with a mobile device for pretty much everything, from chatting with friends to shopping.
“You would think that during the pandemic, with so many people at home, mobile device usage might shrink — but there’s a lot of the data suggesting the opposite (from early February to late March alone, the number of weekly mobile Teams users grew more than 300%),” Jon Friedman, head of Microsoft Office design, explains.
“Personally, I don’t want to be in one room or stare at one screen all the time. Other people also talk about needing to move around or work outside. When I started using the Surface Duo, I could bring a much more powerful, productive experience with me.”
While it’s pretty clear that the Surface Duo does have what it takes to replace a PC for some people, this approach of focusing so much on mobile productivity and going after customers in mobile-first countries brings back the question that was on everyone’s lips last year.
Why isn’t Microsoft offering the Surface Duo with Windows 10X, the operating system that it specifically built for dual-screen and foldable devices?
The answer to this question is apps. Microsoft needs apps, the Surface Duo needs apps, and users in all these countries need apps. A device like the Surface Duo that wants to make a PC the second choice for so many people just needs a huge app ecosystem and Microsoft just doesn’t have the time to build it.
So what better way to go than choose Android?
On the other hand, Microsoft is fully aware that the Surface Duo doesn’t tick all the right boxes when it comes to the mobile experience, and this is why the company keeps insisting that more improvements are on their way.
“The Surface Duo is a first-generation device, and we’re still in the early stages of exploring where it might go next,” Friedman concludes.
If Microsoft learns from all these mistakes is something that just remains to be seen.