Latin American region, which includes South and Central America and the Caribbean.

The company has also been recognised as offering the best support services of any Apple dealer in the region.

MCS partner Mr. Robert Burns said: "We are particularly excited that our region, Latin America, has been a sales growth leader second only to Japan, with real growth of 71 percent last year.

"There are now almost 8,000 Macintosh computers being used in business and at home in Bermuda today.'' Recent negative publicity about Apple in the United States had overlooked some significant facts, said Mr. Burns.

"Apple unit sales have more than doubled over the last two years and the company has restructured to ensure it remains a leader in market share and growth by becoming aggressively price competitive,'' he said.

"This restructure has not affected Apple's plans for the future.

"The company is still investing heavily in research and development and has almost $1 billion in cash.

"It is creating new technologies such as Newton and Macintosh Power PC, as well as leveraging strategic alliances with other companies to secure Apple's future and revolutionise the PC platform, i.e. collaboration with IBM, AT&T and Motorola and others.'' Mr. Burns said Apple was due to release shortly a new line of Macintosh Power personal computers "based on the Power PC processor technology from the Apple/IBM/Motorola alliance''.

"The Power PC technology from Apple and IBM is expected to obsolete all existing PC processors, including Pentium, in both performance and price,'' he said.

TAKING A BYTE OF SUCCESS -- Partners of Apple dealer MCS (from left to right) Mr. Robert Burns, Mr. George Trott, Mr. Tim Kerr and Mr. John DeSilva with their awards for sales and support initiatives.