5 - 11 September 2002 Issue No. 602 Economy	Current issue Previous issue Site map
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875		Recommend this page

Free software

EGYPTIAN private-sector firms still don't use original software. A recent study has revealed that 68 per cent of the software used by the Egyptian private sector is pirated. The study, carried out by AC Nielsen AMER, was intended to estimate the direct revenue losses incurred by the Information Technology (IT) industry as a result of pirated software. Carried out on behalf of the Business Software Alliance (BSA), the study specifically looked at small-medium sized companies, in terms of the number of computers, not workers.

AC Nielsen's study is unique in that it does not base its finding on the number of shipments on any given year, but on the actual installed base. Additionally, it doesn't take the public or educational sectors into account. This is due to the successes achieved by Ministry of Telecommunications and Information Technology in stamping out software piracy, according to Ghada Khalifa, BSA representative in Egypt.

It is estimated that software piracy leads to about $381 million in lost revenues, while the legitimate software market in Egypt is valued at $148 million. The study also found out that piracy has lead to enormous job losses in the IT industry.

The study also looked at how decision making processes in these private companies takes place, in order to assist the BSA in addressing this problem. It showed that, in small businesses, the business owner tends to be the decision maker for software purchases. In medium-sized companies, the software purchase decisions lie with the general manager or CEO along with the financial manager. "We were wrong not to inform them of the Egyptian intellectual property law previously," said Khalifa.

Other infractions were made by local subsidiaries of foreign companies, who were not aware of Egyptian intellectual property law and, accordingly, did not abide by it.

Egyptian private airlines can now fly scheduled routes within the region, but bureaucratic obstacles abound. Sherine Nasr investigates

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