News Release

No. 173/04
December 22, 2004

EU COMMISSION REACTION TO THE ORDER OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE ON MICROSOFT CASE

The European Commission welcomes today's order of the President of the Court of First Instance (CFI) because it means that the Commission's March 2004 Decision (see IP/04/382) becomes effective immediately. Implementation of the Commission's March Decision will not only benefit consumers of computer products in terms of choice of media players on computers and choice of work group servers, but also stimulate innovation. Today's order is important because it preserves the effectiveness of antitrust enforcement, in particular in fast-moving markets as in this case. The order confirms, as the Commission claimed, that this type of case does not fulfill the criteria for a decision to be suspended.