Microsoft’s Surface Pro tablet will go on sale in Europe in the second quarter, and it will be priced somewhere around €899, the firm announced ahead of the CeBit trade show on Monday.
Microsoft Germany’s CEO, Christian Illek, didn’t give the Surface Pro’s exact price in euros, but the number will be around the same as the U.S. price in dollars, he said in a news conference at the company’s booth on the show floor in Hanover.
While an €899 (US$1170) price tag appears significantly higher that the Surface Pro’s U.S. price of $899, a 30-percent mark-up is not unusual for electronics devices in Europe, where prices are typically displayed inclusive of value-added tax at around 20 percent. U.S. prices typically exclude local sales taxes. When setting international prices, vendors also tend to allow an additional margin in case exchange rates shift unfavorably.
In addition to Germany, the Surface Pro will also go on sale in Australia, China, France, Hong Kong, New Zealand and the U.K. in the coming months, Microsoft said.
There was no word on when the device would officially come to the Middle East, though, traditionally, the region does not have to wait its turn much longer than Europe does.
Stands at this year’s CeBit were still under construction at the time of Microsoft’s announcement: The show opens Tuesday and runs through Saturday. Our online editor, Tom Paye, is at the show until Wednesday afternoon. To contact him, email tom@cpidubai.com.
