Microsoft eyes local tongues to boost Office

The latest Microsoft Office suite is catching the fancy of Indian buyers if Microsoft India's numbers are anything to go by. The company claims to have sold over 1.75 million Office 2007 licenses in India since its launch in November 2006. It is now betting big on Office 2007 released not only in English but also in Hindi and other Indian languages.

The Microsoft suite, say analysts, accounts for over 70 per cent of the market share of Office sales in the country. Pankaj Ukey, Office System Product Lead, Microsoft India, says: "The customer adoption for the fully-localised Hindi version of Microsoft Office 2007 has seen sales of over 50,000 since its launch over a month back."

Compared to the previous version, Office 2003 (localised versions, across multiple languages) where Microsoft India sold around 163,000 licenses, the Office 2007 Hindi version seems to have taken a good lead.

The Hindi edition is available with Microsoft Office Professional 2007 and Microsoft Office Home and Student 2007 versions, priced at Rs 20,800 and Rs 6,136, respectively.

The Hindi version, Ukey said, would help Microsoft India extend IT benefits to over 3,372 million Hindi-speaking people in the country.

Microsoft Office Professional, claims Ukey, is the most popular Office suite with customers buying close to 500,000 licenses since its launch.