Kingsoft Office

Infobox Software
name = Kingsoft Office



caption =
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author =
developer = Kingsoft
released =
latest release version = Kingsoft Office 2007
latest release date =
latest preview version =
latest preview date =
frequently updated =
programming language =
operating system =
platform = Microsoft Windows, Linux
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genre = Office suite
license = Proprietary
website = [http://wps.kingsoft.com/ Chinese homepage] , [http://en.kingsoft.com/office.htm English homepage]

Kingsoft Office (marketed as WPS Office in Chinese) is an office suite developed by the Chinese software developer Kingsoft as an alternative to Microsoft Office aimed at the Chinese market.

Since Kingsoft Office 2005, the user interface bears resemblance to the Microsoft Office products, and the suite reads and writes the files generated by Office just like its native documents. The personal edition is free for download.

WPS Office Storm supports 126 languages.

History

Early dominance and fall

The Chinese version is marketed as WPS Office named after the early Kingsoft word processor WPS (Word Processing System). WPS is also used as a promotional acronym for "Writer, Presentation, and Spreadsheets" which are the components of Kingsoft Office. WPS started as a word processor under DOS in 1989. WPS maintained an enormous user base through out the late 1980s and early 1990s.

When Microsoft Office 95 and Windows 95 were introduced into the Chinese market, the influence and sales of WPS went into steep decline. Faced with stiff foreign competition and high level of domestic piracy, Kingsoft was nearly bankrupt by the end of 1995. Kingsoft chief software architect Pak Kwan Kau (求伯君), in an attempt to revive the company, injected 4 million Yuan ("approx. US$500,000 in 2003") into the company by selling his private mansion, and began the development of WPS 97 for Microsoft Windows. When WPS 97 was released in 1997, it struggled to compete with Microsoft Office 97. There were number of reasons for that:
* MS Office 97 was in widespread use and users were reluctant to switch
* MS Office 97 offered more features than WPS 97
* WPS was still just a word processor with no spreadsheet or presentation application

In May 2001, Kingsoft launched WPS Office, which included a word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation software. Again it struggled to compete with the more powerful Microsoft Office 2000.

Revival

In 2002, WPS Office 2002 surfaced as the next version of WPS Office and added to its bundle an email client. In a move hailed by many, WPS Office 2002 cloned Microsoft Office's user interface to the very last detail and as a result dramatically reduced the amount of retraining required to migrate from Microsoft Office. However, critics labeled the strategic move as "the death of software innovation".

When China joined the WTO, the Chinese government look to rid piracy within the government offices. Kingsoft won big contracts and licensed thousands of copies of WPS Office to many local Chinese governments including the governments Beijing and Guangdong. However, Shanghai was unmoved by the low cost of WPS Office and still opted for the more expensive Microsoft Office.

The 2004 incarnation of the office suite, WPS Office Storm, was released in late 2004 to limited fanfare. In its increased effort to converge with Microsoft Office, WPS Office Storm claims to offer perfect compatibility with the Microsoft Office document formats.In a bid to differentiate itself from other office suites, Kingsoft collaborated with Intel and IBM to integrate their text-to-text and text-to-speech technology into WPS Office Storm. Its new technical capabilities became the focal point an advertising campaign. There is 2 version of WPS in Linux, WPS Office Storm(Clone from openoffice) and WPS 2005. Currently King Soft didn't support Linux since WPS 2007.

In late 2005, WPS Office Personal edition has been released as a free download, in hope of introducing the product to more users. This edition is only offered in Simplified Chinese, and can only be used by home users. Kingsoft is constantly updating this personal edition which indicates the company may intend to support and improve the free version as a long term commitment.

In 2007, another edition is released, KingSoft Office 2007, which is available in Chinese, English, and Japanese interface. The personal edition is available for 30 day trial (with the license key available for free by request), the next version will be available in 100 day trial and free version.

Components

Kingsoft Writer

Kingsoft Spreadsheets

Kingsoft Presentation

See also

*List of office suites
*Comparison of office suites
*Web operating system
*Web desktop

External links

* [http://www.kingsoftresearch.com/ Official homepage] en icon
* [http://www.kingsoft02.web.aplus.net/forum/index.php Kingsoft Forum] en icon
* [http://www.kingsoft.com/IR/office.HTM Investor relations page on the product] en icon
* [http://wps.kingsoft.com/ Official homepage] zh-cn icon
* [http://blog.9zi.com/post/1/931 Linux Version Screenshots (WPS 2005 only)] zh-cn icon
* [http://wps.kingsoft.com/download/chp/2005/09/03/63872.shtml Features of Professional Edition] zh-cn icon