Microsoft’s Surface Pro will be making its way to new markets in the coming weeks, including Australia and New Zealand, as well as several European and Asian countries. But aside from the wider availability Liveside.net has spotted an interesting tidbit in the Japanese listing for the tablet -- namely, Microsoft is ditching the 64GB model for this market, and instead is launching a 128GB and an as-of-yet unannounced 256GB variant.
The devices will be sold in Japan starting June 7 through Microsoft’s online store, as well as a number of local retailers for 99,800 yen ($975) and 119,800 yen ($1,170) respectively. For that price the company is also throwing in its pressure-sensitive pen and a copy of Office 2013 Home & Business pre-installed.
Lastly, to celebrate the Surface’s launch in the land of the rising sun, Microsoft is holding a contest to give away 100 limited edition Touch Covers with designs by brands like Beams, and Rodeo Crowns. It's not clear if these will also be made available to buy, but they're said to be exclusive to the Japanese market.
ZDNet reports that the 256GB Surface Pro will eventually be sold in other countries as well, though the site wasn’t able to get any additional details from Microsoft regarding specific countries and target launch dates.
Perhaps we’ll here more at Microsoft's Build developer conference scheduled to kick off June 26. The company is rumored to be working on a second-generation Surface tablet, as well as a 7-inch version. An announcement next month would line up with the arrival of Intel's next generation of processors, dubbed Haswell, which are expected to offer a much needed improvement in battery life and better graphics performance.
