Businessweek reports:

The CEO of anti-piracy group Business Software Alliance says the region lags because software developers don’t have confidence that their intellectual property will be protected

Robert Holleyman, president and CEO of the anti-software piracy trade group, said in an interview with ZDNet Asia: "The domestic market in the region is not as innovative as it could be. The innovation for new, packaged software and products in the market is just not as high as in other parts of the world."

Holleyman explained that Asia has been lagging because of the high piracy rates that are lowering confidence in the region's protection of intellectual property rights.

"Issues like corruption and the lack of law enforcement make [some] countries not so attractive to companies that want to take risks," said Holleyman.

And countries stand to gain from lowering piracy rates, he insisted. Quoting IDC figures, Holleyman said a 10 percent reduction in PC software piracy rates in Asia over the next four years would translate to an extra 435,000 new jobs, equivalent to some US$1 billion in new IT revenue.

He added that China, which cut piracy by 10 percent within three years benefited with a resultant 3.5 times growth in software profits in 2006. And that was still at a rate of 82 percent piracy, showing the country has vast opportunity for growth by way of cutting piracy rates, Holleyman added.

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