Adobe Opens an Online Store in China, Tries to Not Think About Piracy

The design software vendor Adobe (NASDAQ:ADBE) has just launched an online store for China, for the first-time selling copies of its software – such as PhotoShop, DreamWeaver, and the some other programs from its flagship Creative Suite 5.5 – in mainland China.

It’s a turnaround from Adobe’s decade-long shunning of China and some other Asian countries, where rampant piracy of digital goods made official sales channels unsustainable. Pirated copies of popular software – Adobe’s and Microsoft’s (NASDAQ:MSFT) being chief among them – generally sell for as little of 10 RMB (US$1.57).

Sohu’s IT news portal quoted Adobe’s MD for China, Huang Yao-hui, as saying:

The opening of the Adobe store here will be convenient for users, and will allow them to get the very latest in the Adobe software family […] by direct-download, to save money, or by a traditional courier delivery.

The Chinese prices – such as 1,423 RMB for PhotoShop CS5 – are inline with US costs. That’s in contrast to Microsoft’s approach in some regions where it has reduced price-tags to be more in-line with local wages. As a result of that, Microsoft Office Home Edition can be purchased for 250 RMB ($39) which is well below the ordinary $119 set for the US.

Adobe, though, is perhaps aiming this new store at enterprise users, such as the blossoming Chinese start-up sector, or the growing number of design-oriented creative agencies in the country.

Check out the Adobe China store here.