14 DAY TRIAL // We all know that Asian countries don't really dig the Xbox 360 because of various reasons and it seems that is going to continue, no matter what Microsoft does. However, the fact that the company is also having problems in India comes as a surprise for us - a surprise Microsoft doesn't seem to want to hit the world. Oh, well...
According to a CNBC-TV18 report, Microsoft is winding up operations in several cities in India because of repeatedly reported trouble regarding the performance of the console - including everything we already know to be true: poor customer support service, the RRoD and piracy. It seems that Microsoft has gone so far that it has completely withdrawn its products from several Tier-I cities because of the lackluster sales. The same report, quoting anonymous sources, states that the Entertainment and Devices Division has also withdrawn the marketing budget for the entire fiscal year! And this means only one thing: if true, Microsoft is stepping out of the battle.
And it really seems that India is not the best market for Microsoft since, in March this year, Mohit Anand, Country Manager of the gaming decision left the company and rumors suggest that the Marketing Head Ashim Mathur also plans to leave (even though he denies the truthfulness of these reports).
Still... we are ready to accept the fact that Microsoft indeed has troubles in India - since the Xbox 360 was launched back in September 2006, both software and hardware sales have been very low, especially because of piracy (games being available for purchase from gray markets for prices up to 10-15 times lower). All the information is backed up by the fact that Microsoft has repeatedly refused to share the sales numbers in India - and this can only mean bad numbers, since the last days saw Microsoft bragging with their great sales worldwide.