14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft has announced optimistic forecasts for one of the world's largest market and concomitantly a cradle for piracy. In this regard, Microsoft's predictions fall short of dreaming of a Chinese utopia. The Redmond Company has ventured to predict that it expects its products to experience a boost in demand in 2007. This year alone, Microsoft aims to sell 20% more software products in China compared with 2006.
The Redmond Company has a fertile background and is basing its prediction on the concert between the new products available as of 2007 under the Microsoft brand and a national anti-piracy campaign that was debuted in 2005 in China. Windows Vista and the 20078 office system will be without a doubt at the center stage of Microsoft's predicted product sales explosion.
China has increasingly focused on diminishing the rampant levels of piracy for the last couple of years, and Microsoft's forecast is based on the success of the anti-piracy crackdown. However, in China the issue of piracy extends far beyond software to the brands themselves. With Windows Vista and Office 2007, Microsoft has gone to extensive lengths to deliver products that are difficult to counterfeit.
Additionally, the Redmond Company has also reserved a large a portion of its $500 million dollar Wow marketing campaign for advertising on the Chinese market in hope of pushing genuine products. Baking Microsoft's efforts, computer manufacturers are also aiming to sell PCs with the operating system already installed.
Timothy Chen, chief executive officer of Microsoft's greater China region expressed his content with the evolution of the anti-piracy campaign in China, adding that Windows Vista is performing well on the Chinese market.