| PC piracy rates in Thailand have been on a gradual decline, falling by four percentage points over the last three years to the current rate of 73 percent.
This reduced piracy rate is good for innovators in Thailand. As a result of falling software piracy, software companies and entrepreneurs are better able to leverage their intellectual property into business growth, revenue and job creation. According to a study conducted by IDC, reducing software piracy in Thailand by just ten percentage points over the next four years could generate 2,100 new jobs, over 30 billion baht in economic growth, and over 1 billion baht in tax revenues above current projections.
Yet, a software piracy rate of 73 percent remains too high, particularly when compared with the software piracy rate of 59 percent in Asia Pacific.
Thailand needs to continue to work towards concrete educational, legislative and administrative initiatives to effectively lower software piracy year on year, which would help the domestic IT industry grow faster, develop cutting-edge IT products, create more jobs, add to tax revenues and overall GDP growth.
Piracy benefits no one. Piracy causes serious harm and risk to everyone, from users to manufacturers to governments. While users, including individuals, corporate and governments, face a serious threat to their PC security and ensuing mitigating costs, manufacturers lose their valuable R&D investments and government misses the opportunities to collect legitimate taxes from genuine sales, adding to jobs in the industry and overall economic growth. |
