Microsoft to launch prepaid software soon

The cards are currently under tests in Brazil and will take at least another year to get there. Prepaid cards may go a long way in beating piracy, since they promise to make Microsoft products more easy to buy. The cards may also make it impossible for consumers to buy 8216;illegal8217; copies of Microsoft wares.

8220;The cards would be launched in India after a year to 18 months,8221; Craig Mundie, Chief Research and Strategy Officer, Microsoft, said today, after addressing a seminar on intellectual property organised by FICCI.

Mundie admitted that affordability discourages piracy in his address, and said that companies need to find new ways of allowing ownership gain marketshare and beat piracy. He said that prepaid mobile phone cards had achieved both these goals for the telecom sector.

Mundie also said that India must protect intellectual property more rigorously and allow patents on software in order to play a major role in the global information and communications technology sector.

8220;This is something that we are concerned about and that we believe needs to be urgently addressed,8221; Mundie said.