Microsoft Aims For Chinese Market In Search Engines, Games (MSFT)

Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) is looking to make inroads into China with their Xbox 360 home console and Bing search engine, said Microsoft Chief Executive of the Greater China region, Simon Leung.

Leung concedes that there are problems regarding piracy to overcome in China, and that Bing has yet to gain traction in China. However, he believes that China will be the largest PC market in the near future, and growth is the only road there.

Xbox Live authentication should help fight piracy on their game console should they get permission to release it in China, added Leung, as the network will only allow legitimate copies of games to run online. He also believes the upcoming Kinect accessory, which allows motion tracking and control, will be a seller in China given the activity and interaction inherent in the device.

Cloud computing, which Leung believes the country is moving towards, is also much more difficult to pirate, which is a boon to software companies such as Microsoft.

Bing, however, faces an uphill battle, with China’s own Baidu search engine and Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) providing stiff competition. But Leung is optimistic.

“China is going to be a great potential market for us going forward,” he said.