September could be an important month for technology launches, as not only is Apple widely expected to unveil the iPhone 15 at an event in a few weeks, but Microsoft is also getting involved, sending out invites to what it calls a “special event”, which takes place in New York on September 21.
The invitations, sent to selected press outlets (as reported by Windows Central and others), is mostly cryptic, so we don’t have details on what Microsoft plans to reveal. It’s likely we’ll see some new Surface devices, such as the successors to the Surface Laptop 5 and Surface Pro 9.
We may also see the Surface Laptop Studio 2, the successor to Microsoft’s innovative laptop designed for digital creatives, and the affordable Surface Go 4 and Surface Laptop Go 3.
It’s probably a safe bet that Microsoft will also share its vision for the future of its Windows 11 operating system, including any new features coming soon. Windows 11 is getting a major update in September, which will include an early version of its AI-powered Windows Copilot tool.
Speaking of artificial intelligence, you can probably expect Microsoft to talk about it a lot ofbecause it’s added AI capabilities — like the Bing Chat AI chatbot — to a range of its products, including the Edge web browser, and I can’t imagine that push for more AI integration will stop anytime soon.
A bold move
Microsoft has historically held events for its new hardware around the end of September and early October, so there wasn’t much of a surprise when the latest invites dropped. However, September 2023 seems to have a lot of big releases – which could overshadow Microsoft’s revelations.
The Meta Quest 3 VR headset is expected to launch around the same time, and of course there’s hype ahead of the iPhone 15 launch.
Apple’s event will likely be in early September, but with reviews likely to roll in alongside a release date closer to the middle of the month, people will probably still be talking about the new handsets by the time of Microsoft’s events.
Since the demise of Windows Phones, and the lack of success with the Surface Duo 2 foldable phone, Microsoft has no direct competition with the iPhone. Still, there will be a battle over mindshare (and people’s increasingly constrained budgets) that Microsoft will struggle to win.
Now that the Surface devices are seen as Microsoft’s answers to Apple’s iPhone and MacBook products, the company really needs to sell on why people should choose a Surface. While previous Surface products have generally been very good, with a few misfires, they just haven’t captured the public’s attention the way Apple’s devices have.
Microsoft’s job will be made more difficult if Apple has a very successful iPhone 15 launch. The handsets are tightly integrated into the Apple ecosystem, so if a lot of people are buying the new iPhone but also need a new tablet or laptop, they’ll probably opt for an iPad or MacBook to get some of the exclusive features that Apple- devices work together.
This makes it likely that Microsoft will go hard on AI at its event. While the company has been heavily involved in recent AI innovations — it not only offers its own Bing Chat AI, but is also a partner of OpenAI, the company behind the popular ChatGPT AI — Apple seems clearly uninterested in AI so far.
That could all change in the future, but for now, AI could be a big selling point for Surface devices through iPhones, iPads, and MacBooks. Microsoft certainly hopes so.