Recent reports by ELSPA have found that the software sales in the UK has grown over 100%.

This is for the period from 1997 to 2003 and according to the research the cinema box office revenues saw a growth of 30 per cent, VHS and DVD rental growth 14 per cent, and a decline of 4.5 per cent in music retail sales. This sets the UK as the largest market in Europe and the third largest market in the world after the USA and Japan.

Hardware and software, excluding PC hardware, was worth over 2 billion UKP in 2003, reaching an annual rise of 10.8 per cent. It is predicted that by 2007 the market will be worth $21.1 billion.