Microsoft announced today that the Surface Pro tablet will be released in 19 additional countries - including Australia - in May, plus five more by the end of June, as revealed in the Surface blog.
Add to that list the UK, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland in May as well, and the Surface Pro will finally be a global product.
But it won't stop there - the following month, in June, the Surface Pro will launch in Korea, Malaysia, Russia, Singapore, and Thailand.
Surface going global
Unlike the Surface RT, which runs a dumbed-down version of Windows known as Windows RT, the Surface Pro runs a fully functional version of Windows 8.
The Pro version of the Surface tablet is currently availably only in the U.S., Canada and China, but that will change rapidly starting next month as Microsoft's flagship tablet begins rolling out to 24 additional countries.
The Surface RT, meanwhile, already available in 25 markets, will extend its reach soon as well: the inferior Surface tablet will launch in Malaysia on April 25th, in Mexico by the end of May and in Korea and Thailand in June, Microsoft revealed.
Learning from past mistakes
Microsoft claimed that demand for Surface tablets has been high, and that it's had difficulty keeping the 128GB Surface Pro in stock. That may account for the delay in the tablet's global launch - at least that's what Microsoft seems to be saying.
The company also said that would-be Surface users around the world have requested more updates, prompting Microsoft to add:
"To those of you who have pressed for information - please understand that before making these announcements we make sure that we have the volume of devices in place and alignment with our retail partners to do each launch well."
To be fair, any release delays are understandable considering what happened when the Surface Pro launched in the U.S. No doubt Microsoft is eager not to repeat those mistakes.
