Microsoft may cut Windows 8 license cost up to 75% to gain small-devices market

It seems that Microsoft is planning on a price cut of up to 75 percent for Windows 8 licensing for OEMs by this April or May, according to unnamed sources.

The discount would be offered only for the OS installed on a touchscreen PC, which will help boost the sales of small devices, such as laptop computers and tablets that lately had been slow. This would not be all as is being said by The Wall Street Journal that Microsoft will also add a free copy of Office 2013 to tablets sold with screens less than 10.8 inches.

The new Windows 8 license cost that OEMs will be paying with the discount goes around from $20 to $30, and by June it will be reflected on the prices for the final consumers that consequently will be able to buy the devices at a very low price. Right on time for the back-to-school essentials shopping.

Although the information is yet to be confirmed by Microsoft, it was mentioned at Asus’ investor conference, buy their CEO Jerry Shen, that the software giant is making efforts to help OEMs sell more Windows 8 products.

The price cut will be a welcomed discount, but this is not the first attempt we’re seeing to stimulate Windows 8 PC sales. We’ve already seen Best Buy and Staples offering discounts on Windows 8 products with the same goal: sale more PCs! However, now it seems that the folks at Redmond want PC manufacturers to concentrate on small form factor devices. As we already know that the next big update of the operating system, Windows Blue, will be less expensive and will include support for 7-8 inch screen devices among many other features.

Source The Wall Street Journal via Neowin | Image courtesy of Microsoft

About the author

Mauro Huculak is a Windows How-To Expert who started Pureinfotech in 2010 as an independent online publication. He has also been a Windows Central contributor for nearly a decade. Mauro has over 14 years of experience writing comprehensive guides and creating professional videos about Windows and software, including Android and Linux. Before becoming a technology writer, he was an IT administrator for seven years. In total, Mauro has over 20 years of combined experience in technology. Throughout his career, he achieved different professional certifications from Microsoft (MSCA), Cisco (CCNP), VMware (VCP), and CompTIA (A+ and Network+), and he has been recognized as a Microsoft MVP for many years. You can follow him on X (Twitter), YouTube, LinkedIn and About.me.