Microsoft’s rapid expansion in Russia: “An almost perfect synergy”
Now, Russia is the fastest growing market for Microsoft’s genuine products in the entire world. The question is why is that so, since there exist many different operating systems which can enter Russian software market and gain a large share of it. The answer is the unusual and successful marketing strategy of Microsoft in 1990’s, after the fall of Soviet Union. Microsoft began spreading its software – Windows, to Russia at low or no cost for the consumers (which caused negative profit for the company), therefore populating the Russian software market with its products. In addition to that, it closed eyes on the illegal and pirated copies of Windows. As a result, after several years of such campaign, all the computers in Russia had Windows Operating System installed on them, and only few knew about the existence of other software companies, such as Apple. When the entire market was theirs, Microsoft forced stricter validity check norms in the products, which minimized the its presence in the black market, and raised the price of the product so that Microsoft would be making profit from sales. Because everyone was used to Windows and did not want to switch to another operating system, more and more people began buying the genuine copies, which led to Russia becoming one of the largest consumers of Microsoft’s operating sytem.
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