Microsoft recent Surface launch was full of surprises, as the company took the wraps off a folding phone (the Surface Duo) and PC device (the Surface Neo).
But alongside these headline-catching launches were the latest generation of the company’s Surface devices, with new additions to the Laptop, Book and Pro lines.
But with so many new offerings coming to the market, how does Microsoft look to ensure it stays focused on its self-declared aim to “enable people to achieve more”?
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Shifts
"As we release multiple generations of the products, we get a lot of feedback,” Aidan Marcuss, CVP, Devices Portfolio and Operations at Microsoft, told TechRadar Pro at a recent company media event.
“We've taken a big step forward in growing and adding whole product lines that address customer feedback and customer needs.”
"There's not some master spreadsheet somewhere that says, 'here's every product that should exist', and we're going to work our way through it,” he adds. “But thinking about it from a customer end...each time we add a new product line, it's very intentional, saying that we got feedback, or the technology has enabled something.”
Microsoft’s new devices look to be an ideal partner for all kinds of users, both enterprise and consumer, with Marcuss saying the company has taken on feedback from all kinds of users.
In particular, the current trend of businesses refreshing their device portfolios in the continued switch to Windows 10, as well as the growing demand to have the latest technology in the workplace for maximum mobility and productivity, has seen Surface devices become popular choices for firms across many verticals.
“Our industry goes through big shifts, and it kind of feels like we're in one of those moments where a lot of enterprises are modernising across a number of dimensions at once - and a device is a really important part of this.”
Along with hardware upgrades and design changes, Microsoft’s new Surface products feature improvements in terms of security and serviceability, with the latter making it easier than ever to adapt a device for particular users and purposes.
But it seems that the sheer range of devices could be the key to seeing Microsoft’s continued growth in the hardware space.
As Marcuss notes, “we don't just want to innovate, we want to build products people can rely on for multiple generations.”
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