Microsoft Makes New Offer In Antitrust Dispute

by Glen Shapiro, LawAndTax-News.com, New York

27 March 2006

Responding to the European Commission's continued threats to impose fines on it, Microsoft last week announced that it will offer free, unlimited technical support to licensees of the European Commission’s Workgroup Server Protocol Program, in addition to providing on-site assistance to licensees to further help facilitate the development process.

Microsoft confirmed that it has submitted a work plan to the Monitoring Trustee detailing a number of projects to enhance the Program’s technical documentation.

The EC in December issued a Statement of Objections against Microsoft for its failure to comply with certain of its obligations under the March 2004 Commission decision, which found Microsoft to have infringed the EC Treaty rules on abuse of a dominant position by leveraging its near monopoly in the market for PC operating systems onto the markets for work group server operating systems and for media players.

One of the remedies imposed by the decision was for Microsoft to disclose complete and accurate interface documentation which would allow non-Microsoft work group servers to achieve full interoperability with Windows PCs and servers. However, trustee Neil Barrett stated that the information provided by the software giant was not adequate in the form in which it was submitted.

“Although five European computer science professors have already confirmed that our documentation meets or exceeds industry standards, we are committed to doing everything in our power to address the Commission’s concerns,” announced Brad Smith, Microsoft Senior Vice President and General Counsel.

Microsoft has also pledged to continue making Windows source code available as a reference implementation and to continue working with the Commission’s technical advisors and industry representatives to constantly improve the technical documentation.

However, the EC's response to the proposal has been somewhat lukewarm, according to international media reports.

Speaking to the International Herald Tribune last year, Jonathan Todd, a spokesman for the EU competition commissioner, Neelie Kroes observed that:

"At first sight it seems to be a constructive proposal."

However, according to the IHT, he argued that the technical documents Microsoft has provided rivals thus far are still too difficult to understand.

"Companies trying to compete with Microsoft must be able to have access to usable, workable documentation and should not be forced to rely on help from Microsoft staff," he concluded.

Recommended