Sales of Russian software in retail grew 6 times

For the first five months of 2023, sales of Russian software in the consumer segment were 2.5–6 times higher compared to the same period a year earlier, Wildberries, M.Video-Eldorado and Ozon calculated. The leaders of sales were operating systems “Red OS” and Uncom OS, a package of office applications “P7-office”, as well as antiviruses Kaspersky and Dr.Web.

Since the beginning of 2023, 15,000–20,000 licenses for Russian software of various categories have been sold in Russia every month, while 100,000 pieces of antiviruses are sold separately every month, says a source in one of the major developers. Sergey Vilyanov, an analyst at the Fintech Lab accelerator, calls a similar sales estimate. According to his calculations, about 1 million licenses for domestic software have been sold in retail since the beginning of the year.

The growing demand for domestic software was observed against the backdrop of foreign suppliers leaving the market, an Ozon representative says. The marketplace presents both “classics” from market leaders such as Kaspersky, Dr.Web, and products from relatively new Russian suppliers, such as P7-office, Red OS, etc. Since last year, the M .Video-Eldorado, the Red OS operating system, as well as the P7-office office suite, became available, and in May this year, the Uncom OS operating system appeared, a retailer representative said. Basically, demand this year was formed due to antiviruses and products for enterprise automation, the representative of Wildberries added.

Russian operating systems are installed mainly on laptops and PCs without a pre-installed operating system during the sale, the representative of M.Video-Eldorado specified. What brands are sold in this category, he did not specify. But, according to a Vedomosti source on one of the online platforms, now the share of such laptops in the Russian market is 25-30%. Historically, they were imported by all brands and in retail this made it possible to reduce the price of goods by several tens of dollars, Vilyanov draws attention. In 2014–2015 Windows was installed on about 90% of computers brought to Russia, and now the share is in the range of 70-80%, he admits.

In the first five months of 2023, compared to the same period last year, the demand for domestic solutions at Avito increased by 73%. Currently, Kaspersky antivirus accounts for 69% of the total demand in the antivirus category. In office software, interest in P7-office is growing, among OS – on Astra Linux, said the representative of Avito.

A representative of the R7-office developer said that in 2023, license sales increased 8 times. The share of OS distribution downloads from the site is 30%, the rest is offline retail purchases, he added. The number of installations of MyOffice solutions for private users in the first half of 2023 doubled compared to the same period in 2022, said Pavel Kalyakin, CEO of the company. At the moment, products for home use have been downloaded more than 20 million times, he said.

In January – May 2023, there was indeed a multiple growth in sales year on year, including in retail, said the deputy general director of Red Soft (the creator of Red OS) Rustam Rustamov. He connects this not only with the increased demand for domestic software, but also with an increase in the number of retail sites. In addition, the company is developing technological cooperation with Chinese brands and the developer’s products are compatible with computer equipment of well-known foreign brands that have left the Russian Federation, Rustamov added.

At Dr.Web, sales growth in the stated period is kept at an average level of 15–20%, Svetlana Teodorovich, head of the department for working with partners of the company, pointed out. In January-May 2023, sales of Kaspersky Lab products for home users in Russia increased by 10% year-on-year, Sergey Pikkat-Ordynsky, head of the company’s consumer market in Russia and the CIS, said. In 2023, according to a representative of F+ tech | Marvel”, Kaspersky occupied 95.9% of the Russian consumer market in units and 96.4% in money, while in 2022 the developer’s share was slightly above 70% in both parameters.

The growth in sales of domestic software is due to the low base effect, as developers recently started retail sales, explains a representative of F + tech | Marvel”. “Red OS” is one of the main domestic operating systems on Linux, which does not differ in quality from the rest, but shows noticeable marketing activity, Vilyanov argues. It is possible that the company entered into an agreement with retailers to install the OS “by default” or motivated sellers to implement this product, he adds. The demand for “P7-office” is connected with the lack of sale of the Microsoft office suite, the expert believes.

There are no special problems with the compatibility of computers and laptops with a basic configuration with Russian operating systems, Vilyanov continues. Problems start when trying to expand the configuration, such as connecting a new model of printer or webcam, he says. This is due to the fact that their manufacturers rarely care about the availability of drivers for Linux, and OS developers cannot write drivers for everything that is on the market, the expert warns.

2022 was an introductory year for users, they were looking at products, but users will pay attention to proven solutions that will work stably, Pikkat-Ordynsky added. The main growth points of the market will be office suites and backup tools, Vilyanov predicts. In addition, licenses for foreign products are now running out en masse, which are difficult to renew, and this will also become an incentive for the market, he concluded.