ELCOT had asked Microsoft to supply its operating system for Rs.500 ($12). But Microsoft offered a bundled version of its operating system, office suite and anti virus software for Rs.2500 ($57). This is not acceptable for ELCOT as this was an academic edition. ELCOT does not accept the marketing concept called ‘academic edition’. There can be only one price for ELCOT to market a product. Academic edition concept goes against this principle. Again, Microsoft has bundled its offer. ELCOT believes in openness. Any such bundling could result in serious exploitation of the consumer. This could be considered an anti-consumer move. ELCOT cannot support an anti consumer move. Hence ELCOT asked Microsoft to debundle its offer.

Microsoft India is yet to provide the revised offer (Rs.500/$12 for its operating system and debundling its current offer to fix the price of its office suite and anti virus software). Once we receive Microsoft’s revised offer which is acceptable to ELCOT, we would get back to you with our offer for Microsoft products.

They are using Linux to game MS and negotiate – nothing more…