Microsoft is lagging behind iOS and Android devices in many regards,  and some people are thinking that the company just isn’t serious enough about their mobile offerings.  But people’s perception might change when they see Microsoft’s leaked roadmap of their OS for mobile devices.  Microsoft’s been working behind the scenes on its mobile platform as well as the rest of its connected devices line-up, and anticipation only continues to build as the public wait for all these moving parts to coalesce into a comprehensive strategy.

The roadmap states that Microsoft is right on track with their Mango offerings.  By the second quarter of 2012 they aim to release Tango, the next line for their mobile OS, but instead of putting Tango in high-end phones, they will be concentrating on cheaper, affordable phones.  This might be an influence from Nokia, since they are known for producing both high end and low end phones to meet the demands across consumer price points. Then by the fourth quarter of 2012, they will be releasing Apollo together with high end super phones.

Microsoft’s big plans

If you think that’s all Microsoft has to offer, think again.  They have so much in store for 2012.  To kick things off, they’ve announced that the 2012 International Consumer Electronics Show would be the last time they would attend CES.  They are following the steps of other Silicon Valley giants like Apple who hold their own events when launching products rather than participating in a trade show where you have to compete with everyone just to get noticed.

“We asked, ‘Are we doing something because it’s the right thing to do, or because it’s the way we’ve always done it?’ ” Frank Shaw, Microsoft’s vice president of communications, said in a blog post pertaining to the decision to abandon succeeding CES.

Then by mid-January, at the National Retail Federation show in New York, Microsoft will be unveiling the next generation of multitouch technology officially dubbed as Samsung SUR40 which debuted as Surface 2.0 at this year’s 2011 CES.

According to ZDNet, “The SUR40 can be used as a table, a wall-mountable and/or vertical/horizontal kiosk. It features a 40-inch HD 1080p screen and is four inches thin (including the glass, PC and enclosure). The system runs an embedded version of 64-bit Windows 7 Professional. Microsoft introduced a software-development kit for the Surface 2.0 in July 2011. The SUR40 relies on PixelSense — which uses the pixels of the screen itself to act as cameras to capture objects placed on the surface.”

And as for other leaked information, LG is said to be unveiling a smartphone that runs the Windows Phone 7.5 Mango.  The hush-hush device could be the LG Fantasy, which features a 4-inch touchscreen display with an IPS LCD panel, a 1.3 megapixel front-facing camera, a 5 megapixel camera at the back, and the three usual Windows Phone buttons (Back, Windows, and Search).  No news yet as to whether this device will be demoed at CES 2012.