n092  1816  07 Feb 85
BC-SOVCOMPUTE
(Exclusive; 10 p.m. EST embargo)
Soviets Seeking To Buy Personal Computers From West
By DAVID E. SANGER
c.1985 N.Y. Times News Service
    NEW YORK - The Soviet Union is negotiating to buy large numbers of
Western-made personal computers, including Apple and IBM models,
according to industry sources.
    The computers are apparently for use in scientific institutes and
schools.
    The move marks the first time the Russians have sought personal
computers from Western nations and Japan in the open market. It is
possible because of recently liberalized high-technology trade rules
that went into effect five weeks ago.
    According to Western experts, the action also comes at a time when
Soviet scientists have complained about their country's faltering
efforts to build its own microcomputers. As a result, Western-made
personal computers have been smuggled into the Soviet Union for some
time, but at great expense, preventing the purchase of large
quantities.
    ''It is clear the Soviets have assigned some hard currency to buy
the personal computers - the question is how many,'' said an official
of the International Business Machines Corp., in Washington. He added
that the Soviet Ministry of Trade had not yet placed an order with
his company and that it could be months before any deal was closed.
    Executives at other computer companies say the Russians are talking
about buying several thousand machines, possibly tens of thousands.
Reliable figures are hard to come by, experts say, because Soviet
ordering of computers has quickly spread across Great Britain,
France, West Germany, and Japan, involving a host of computer dealers
and import-export concerns as well as manufacturers.
    ''It is a great opportunity for us, in a marketplace that has gone
begging up to now because of the rules that were in place,'' said
Albert A. Eisenstat, a vice president of Apple Inc. He said the
Cupertino, Calif., company had had ''indirect contacts'' with the
Russians in recent weeks.
    Sinclair Research Ltd., a British microcomputer maker, displayed its
wares at a computer fair in Moscow last month, the Soviet Union's
first, and said on Thursday that it was negotiating to sell computers
to the Russians for use in secondary schools.
    Executives of most computer companies are unwilling to discuss their
new relations with the Russians in detail. Part of their hesitancy
appears to stem from the fact that both the United States and the
Soviet Union have made use of microcomputers in simulating and
controlling missile launchngs, a fact that the Defense Department
used last year to argue against relaxing trade controls.
    ''We have no illusions,'' an executive of a major computer
manufacturer said this week. ''Some of these are headed for the
military.''
    But the computers are so widely available from a variety of sources,
another executive said, that ''it would be a waste of everyone's time
to try to stop them.''
    The European members of the Coordinating Committee for Multilateral
Export Controls, or COCOM, used a similar argument last year, saying
the export-control group should concentrate on preventing the leakage
of truly vital technologies. COCOM, which includes Japan and all NATO
countries except Spain and Iceland, coordinates export controls on
goods going to communist nations.
    Until new Commerce Department regulations, based on the COCOM
agreement, went into effect Jan. 1, it was virtually impossible to
legally export an up-to-date personal computer from the United States
to a communist nation. But the new rules make it far easier for the
Eastern bloc to obtain basic personal computer models, including the
IBM Personal Computer and PCjr home computer models and the popular
Apple II line.
    The complex, 24-page set of new rules, which have caused widespread
confusion in the industry, essentially sets up three levels of export
controls on personal computers.
    At the first level, the least sophisticated machines - largely
out-of-date computers no longer sold by American manufacturers -
require no export licenses.
    At the second level, most medium-powered 8- and 16-bit machines,
such as the basic Apple and IBM models, require Commerce Department
and Defense Department approval before they can be shipped to a
communist nation. But officials say those machines are ''presumed to
be exportable,'' and a shipment can be stopped only if it seems
suspicious, or if the number of machines requested exceeds the
allowable limit under a single export license.
    ''The rules have been agreed upon, and if there is a legitimate end
use and end user, the license will be approved,'' Walter Olson,
deputy assistant secretary of commerce for export administration,
said in a telephone interview.
    At the third level, stricter controls cover more sophisticated
personal computers, such as IBM's PC-AT and Apple's Macintosh
machine. Shipments of those computers must be approved by federal
officials and the Paris-based COCOM.
    A vigorous debate is still under way in Washington over the controls
that should be imposed on computer programs, or software. But
industry experts note that software is easy to smuggle out of the
country. It can be stored on a tiny floppy disk or sent over a
telephone line in minutes.
    
nyt-02-07-85 2114est
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