(Nikkei BP Group)
(No.1 High-Tech News Site in Japanese)
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| Japan Windows 98 Sales Hit 330,000 Copies in Nine Days
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August 12, 1998 (TOKYO) -- Sales of the Japanese version of Windows 98
are brisk, with 330,000 copies purchased in the first nine days of sale.
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This assumption was made by Nikkei Market Access based on its survey
of large-scale personal computer shops in Akihabara, Tokyo's electronics
district, and on GfK Japan Ltd.'s statistics 3,200 stores of 55 companies.
GfK Japan is an information service company dealing with point-of-sales
(POS) data of large electrical appliance stores.
According to calculations by GfK Japan, there is a three-way breakdown
of sales of Windows 98 packages: 4.8 percent were reserved before the
release, 60.8 percent were sold two days after the release and 34.4
percent were purchased the following seven days. In terms of the type
of the version, 91 percent of the sales were upgrade packages, while
9 percent were standard packages.
There seem to be many Windows 95 users willing to purchase the Windows
98 upgrade version, but they haven't purchased it because the upgrade
requires updating the basic input/output system (BIOS) and other system
requirements.
Sales of the Windows 98 package are expected to slow down, but sustain
a certain level in the coming one or two months. The total number of
sales is estimated to be about 500,000 packages at the end of August
1998, one month after the release.
Microsoft Co., Ltd. of Japan revised its sales target upwardly from 500,000
copies for a three-month period to 700,000 copies. The revised target
is likely to be accomplished.
Nikkei Market Access, in cooperation with GfK Japan, reported on the
Web the daily sales of Windows 98 at 3,200 large electrical appliance
stores from Aug. 7 (information available only in Japanese).
GfK Japan deals with POS data of 55 IT-related retailers, or approximately
3,200 (as of April 1998) large stores of electrical appliances throughout
Japan.
It is assumed that GfK Japan's reports cover 10 percent of total PC shipments
in Japan, or about 40 percent of PC sales at stores.
It is also estimated that sales of software for PCs at the stores covered
by GfK amount to 20-30 percent of total software sales in Japan.
(Nikkei Market Access)
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