A possible Microsoft-built Windows Phone prototype from the pre-Surface Duo era has surfaced, according to Digital Trends, offering a limited look at a handset the company may have explored before its Nokia acquisition reshaped its mobile strategy. Digital Trends reports that newly published images were shared by a user on Discord and Telegram and first spotted by Windows Central. The prototype reportedly dates to 2013 or 2014 and may have carried the codename “Raven.” The evidence is visual and secondhand, so the central claim remains appropriately hedged: the images may show a Microsoft phone concept, but they do not confirm a commercial Surface Phone plan. The device shown looks aligned with Microsoft’s hardware language from that period. Digital Trends describes a silver metal frame similar in tone to the Surface 2, a Microsoft logo on the rear, dedicated navigation buttons beneath a 720p display, and an unknown Qualcomm processor. The phone is also shown running an early development version of Windows Phone from September 2013, while Microsoft was working toward what became Windows Phone 8.1. Other details place it firmly in the smartphone design norms of the early 2010s. Digital Trends says the prototype had separate volume controls and a camera shutter button on the right side, a power button on top, a headphone jack and micro-USB port on the bottom, and a SIM slot on the left. The bigger question is what Microsoft intended to do with it. Digital Trends notes that there is no confirmation Raven was meant to become a commercial Surface Phone. The company almost certainly tested multiple prototype devices around that time, and this may have been one of several internal explorations rather than a product nearing launch. The timing matters because Microsoft announced its acquisition of Nokia’s devices and services business in 2013, with the deal closing in 2014. Digital Trends frames that transaction as a likely reason a separate Microsoft-designed Windows Phone would have become less central once Lumia hardware came under Microsoft’s control. Microsoft later kept releasing Windows phones, including Lumia models such as the 640, 950, 650, and 550, before backing away from the platform. By 2017, Digital Trends writes, Windows Phone was no longer a priority. Microsoft returned to phone hardware in 2020 with the Surface Duo, but that was a dual-screen Android device rather than the Windows-powered Surface Phone many had once imagined. Who benefits: The main beneficiaries are Microsoft hardware watchers, collectors, and analysts trying to reconstruct the company’s mobile decision-making before the Surface Duo. Who's exposed: There is little direct market exposure because the report concerns an old, unreleased prototype. The main risk is interpretive: the images do not prove that Raven was a near-commercial Surface Phone.