The Microsoft Surface Pro Mini was touted to be the company's answer to the small tablet market currently dominated by the iPad mini, iPad Air, and numerous Android products. It was set to be released in spring 2015 but the company reportedly pulled it out at the very last minute. Now, a new report confirms that Microsoft indeed cancelled the Surface Pro Mini lineup.
In an interview with ZDNet, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella stated that the Surface Pro Mini was pulled from the May unveiling event because it didn't stand out from the rest of the competition. Nadella continued to explain that they didn't want to base their products on the success of other companies.
"We either took something very complex and made it simple so that everyone in the world could adopt it," Nadella explained, "or created something where it didn't already exist -- where nobody came to us and said, this is what we want. Once we did it, everybody wanted it. That's the bar for devices and our software and services."
The demand for small tablets running on Windows OS is also seeing a decline. According to a report from Mashable, Lenovo was set to release a few products stateside but cancelled these plans because the demand for them wasn't strong enough.
The Surface Pro Mini was rumored to run on Windows RT or Windows 8.1 but according to the report, the company might have made the switch to run Windows 10 on the device. Fans may never know because there are no definitive plans from Microsoft right now to release the Surface Pro Mini.
According to a report from the Independent, the device might still be launched if Microsoft finds a way to make the device different from its competitors. The report cites that Microsoft might focus on "productivity" credentials along with the Surface Pen and that this might help see the Surface Pro Mini get released.
