MICROSOFT OFFICE OPENS IN YEREVAN

Noyan Tapan
May 17 2006

YEREVAN, MAY 17, NOYAN TAPAN. The official ceremony of opening the
Yerevan Office of the Microsoft company took place in Yerevan on May
16. According to the company’s information, so far, Microsoft has
opened its representative offices in such CIS countries as Russia,
Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Armenia and Azerbaijan. Microsoft’s Deputy
Regional Chairman for Central and Eastern Europe Vahe Torosian said
that the company management made this decision, taking into account
a high level of knowledge in the spheres of high technologies,
engineering, mathematics and physics in the regional countries,
particularly in Armenia. “We should try to develop a powerful,
healthy and competitive system of information technologies in
Armenia,” he noted. According to him, one of Microsoft’s first
undertakings in Armenia will be translation of the operation system
Windows XP into Armenian and making it available to consumers in
late summer 2006. Microsoft has such a problem as protection of
intellectual property rights, particularly, unlicensed use of its
software. V. Torosian said that in this respect they encounter serious
problems in all CIS countries, including in Armenia where up to 90%
of the software used are unlicensed.