‘The Ural licensed software market is a little behind Moscow’s one at the moment. Yekaterinburg has so far reached the level Moscow was at in the year 2006,’ General Director of Softkey (an online software-selling supermarket) Felix Muchnik said in the course of a press conference in Yekaterinburg.

Softkey conducted its annual research on software users in July and August 2008 and came to the conclusion that the share of licensed software used in the Urals comes to 4% of the country’s market; that of Moscow comes to 40%.

‘Until quite recently, there was no software market to speak of in the Russian provinces. What people did have was an impromptu bazaar of sorts. Things are gradually beginning to change, but the market is still rather unstable. Let’s put it this way: people are developing a better attitude to licensed software, but no specific measures have been taken as of yet. As far as the Ural market is concerned, it’s reaching the turning point where things might start improving,’ Muchnik explained.