Anti-piracy efforts to buoy Adobe South Asia sales

Graham Freeman Adobe senior VP Worldwide Sales

SINGAPORE--Adobe Systems Inc expects revenues to grow 35% in South Asia this year, particularly from markets such as Singapore and Malaysia.

This should come from an increasing number of Web pages as more companies in the region take to cyberspace. The rise in content will mean bigger demand for Adobe's desktop publishing software.

The company is also known for Adobe Acrobat Reader, which has become a de facto standard for document distribution on the Web.

Adobe senior vice president for worldwide sales Graham Freeman, who made the bright forecast, also noted that the company's anti-piracy efforts will continue to pay off in 2001.

In fact, Freeman estimated that almost half of its South Asia business in 2000 came as a result of anti-piracy initiatives. He declined to provide revenue details, but added that South Asia sales grew 265 percent last year.

"Our anti-piracy campaigns last year, in Malaysia and Singapore particularly, gave us a significant one-off revenue stream," he said, explaining last year's hefty figure. "We do not expect to see that repeated."

Regional markets emcompasses Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, India and the Philippines.

Adobe's worldwide sales for the year ended 31 November 2000 hit US$1.27 billion. The company does not provide regional breakdowns.