July 31st, 1995: In a first for IBM worldwide, the company will give away 40,000 free copies of OS/2, PC DOS 7, Lotus Notes and Virtual n'gineer on a CD-ROM included with the August 1995 issue of India's PC Quest magazine. Expected in the second week of August, the CD-ROM will contain fully functioning, complete versions of IBM's two operating systems. Lotus Notes and Virtual n'gineer are provided in limited versions without network support, and all the package are licensed for a 90-day trial period.
Apart from Tata Information Systems Limited - IBM's Indian joint venture - Microsoft, Novell and other software companies will also pay to have their products included in the CD-ROM, although these are only demo versions.
The CD-ROM is being produced by PC Quest and is being distributed with the magazine for the first time. PC Quest hopes to encourage Indian home consumers to value legal software, and also spur sales of CD-ROM drives. PC Quest also plans to negotiate a special price from an Indian vendor of Rs 6,000 (US$ 180) per drive.
It is still possible that the CD-ROMs, which are being pressed in Singapore as high duties on raw materials make Indian presses uncompetitive, will get delayed in Customs. PC Quest will probably pay over US$ 5 duty on the CD-ROMs, ten times their cost.
More information on India's idiotic import duties here.TECHONOMIST COPYRIGHT NOTICE AND SUBSCRIPTION
(C) Copyright 1995 Deus X Machina, Rishab Aiyer Ghosh. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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