Toshiba insisted that it will not compensate its Chinese customers following the detection of a possible defect in its notepad, despite the fact that it paid US$30.3 million out to the California State Government, one of its institutional purchasers, on Wednesday.
The internationally famous notepad provider was first accused by two American users last March, who claimed the notepad's defect could likely destroy saved documents on the computer.
According to a settlement reached out of court, Toshiba will pay US users a total of US$1 billion for possible damages.
Toshiba was accused by several Chinese users early this year, who also demanded compensation.
Masaichi Koga, the company's vice-president, arrived in Beijing this May and offered to provide free software to notepad users to counter the defect.
"The Chinese market is of great importance to Toshiba," said Wei Xue, the company's spokeswoman.
According to Wei, to date there have been no reports of damage to saved documents by 15 million Toshiba notepad users.
Toshiba's share in China's notepad market declined in the first half of the year due to news of the possible defect in its product.
According to statistics provided by Wei, the company occupied 19.4 percent of the notepad market in the first quarter of 2000. That number fell to 15.4 percent in the second quarter.
Toshiba's share in China's notepad market now ranks third, after Legend and IBM, although it was first last year with a share of 22 percent.
However, according to statistics provided by the Beijing-based Jingshenbo Research Company, Toshiba's market share in the first two quarters of this year was just above 10 percent, ranking it fourth after IBM, Legend and Compaq.
(China Daily 12/19/2000)
