Officially, Microsoft has suspended its operations in Russia.

U.S. technology giant Microsoft has sent letters to thousands of private companies in Russia with offers to extend their software licenses, a news report says.

According to the Kommersant, Microsoft has chosen to continue business with Russian companies that are not under American sanctions, in spite of its commitment to suspend the Russian operations in response to Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine.

In March 2022, the US headquarters announced a halt to new sales and promised to wind its Russian business down to a still.

Its subsidiary Microsoft Rus later fired almost all employees and declined to renew the office rentals, but decided not to close.

"As far as Russia is concerned, we're going to reduce our business until eventually there's little or nothing left," company president Brad Smith told The Washington Post in June same year.

The Kommersant report quoted Vitaly Mankevich, head of the Russian-Asian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, as saying that about 1,000 private companies have received the license extension offer from the U.S. tech corporation. Among these are many subsidiaries of foreign investors which have remained in Russia.

Mankevich suggested that Microsoft was not under Western pressures to withdraw from the Russian Federation completely and in fact it was “considering to return.”

Microsoft has not commented yet on the report. If true, it means the US company seeks to preserve its presence in the Russian market and reduce the level of piracy, which is inevitable. IT solutions distributors continue selling licenses for software that has been already delivered to Russia.

In 2022, Microsoft Rus earned 6.4 billion rubles, reporting 159 million rubles (1.77 million euros) in profit. The suspension of operations in Russia cost the American giant 125 million US dollars, according to Russian estimates.