A survey of major German companies showed on Wednesday that only one percent are using Windows Vista, the new Microsoft operating system for personal computers introduced a year ago. The survey covered 359 companies based in Germany, Austria and Switzerland with annual sales of at least 100 million euros (150 million dollars).
Conducted by Droege and Comp, a German consultancy, and the newspaper Handelsblatt, it was made public at the CeBITcomputing trade fair in Hanover, Germany.
Achim Berg, chief executive of Microsoft Germany, rejected concern Monday that many corporate customers had so far decided to stay with the predecessor, Windows XP.
Microsoft said in January it had sold more than 100 million Vista licences around the world. Berg said individual users had been the motivating force in the first year of Vista sales. "That's a normal cycle," he said.
The release of the first service pack, SP1, would encourage more corporate users to migrate to Vista, he predicted, adding, "SP1 increases the speed tangibly and has a better user interface."