The story of the Surface mini is one that has taken many turns - from nearly all of the specs leaking to being canceled at the last minute to finally being heavily referenced in the Surface Pro 3 documentation. And now, we finally have Microsoft talking about the device, albeit indirectly; we believe that the "new form factor" that they decided not to ship, was, in fact, the Surface mini.
We pulled out the audio of the Surface segment from the earnings call and posted it above. Microsoft also shared some good news, saying that the Pro 3 is selling faster than the previous versions of the Surface. However, that should not be a huge surprise as it is believed that prior iterations of the Surface have not sold all that well. Still, the fact that the Pro is outpacing prior iterations is clearly a good thing for Microsoft, as it suggests that buyers are finally starting to warm to its homegrown tablet.
We still don"t know if Microsoft will ever ship the Surface mini; prior rumors said that the company was waiting until the touch version of Office was ready to ship which could be this fall, at the earliest. But the longer they wait, the more outdated the internals of the device become. If, as many expect, the touch-friendly version of Office does not arrive until next year, the internals of the Surface mini would have to be updated to meet market expectations at its launch.
Microsoft had a lot to talk about during their earnings call, including the next version of Windows; you can also read about their latest financial report here.