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News Releases
No. 97/07
September 17, 2007
EUROPEAN COMMISSION WELCOMES COURT RULING UPHOLDING
COMMISSION'S DECISION ON MICROSOFT'S ABUSE OF DOMINANT
MARKET POSITION
The European Commission welcomes today's
ruling by the
European Court of First Instance upholding the
European
Commission’s 2004 decision on
Microsoft's abuse of its
dominant market position and confirming the totality of
the fine imposed. In this decision, Microsoft was fined
497 million euros for infringing the
EC Treaty rules on
abuse of a dominant market position (Article 82) 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. This conduct
hindered innovation in the markets concerned to the
detriment of consumers. To put an end to this abusive
behavior, the Commission ordered Microsoft to disclose
interoperability information which would allow
non-Microsoft work group servers to achieve full
interoperability with Windows PCs and servers and to
offer a version of its Windows operating system without
Windows Media Player. The Court’s ruling confirms that
the Commission was right to prohibit Microsoft's
anti-competitive conduct which harmed competition to the
detriment of consumers.
 EU
Competition Commissioner
Neelie Kroes stated:
"The Court
has upheld a landmark Commission decision to give
consumers more choice in software markets. That decision
set an important precedent in terms of the obligations
of dominant companies to allow competition, in
particular in high tech industries. The Court ruling
shows that the Commission was right to take its
decision. Microsoft must now comply fully with its legal
obligations to desist from engaging in anti-competitive
conduct. The Commission will do its utmost to ensure
that Microsoft complies swiftly."
In upholding the Commission’s decision, the European
Court of First Instance (CFI) confirmed the Commission’s
finding that Microsoft had abused its dominant position
in the PC operating system market by refusing to disclose
interoperability information that would enable its
competitors to fully interoperate with Windows PCs and
servers and by tying Windows Media Player with its
dominant Windows PC operating system. The CFI confirms
that both types of conduct reduced competition in the
relevant markets, thereby preventing innovation and
choice to the substantial detriment of consumers. The
Commission's decision established that Microsoft
prevented innovative server products from being brought
to the market, and that competition in the streaming
media player market was distorted.
The CFI confirmed the Commission's assessment as to the
appropriate legal tests to be applied, and the evidence
needed to satisfy those tests. However, the CFI annulled
the decision in so far as it orders Microsoft to submit
a proposal for the appointment of a monitoring trustee
with the power to have access, independently of the
Commission, to Microsoft’s assistance, information,
documents, premises and employees and to the source code
of the relevant Microsoft products and in so far as it
provides that all the costs associated with that
monitoring trustee be borne by Microsoft.
The Commission will carefully analyze the judgment and
will consider its implications for future antitrust
enforcement in these sectors and in others. It is clear,
however, that this is an exceptional case with extremely
harmful abuses by a company in a quasi-monopolistic
position on a market. The Commission decision upheld by
the CFI focuses on the promotion of interoperability,
which contributes strongly to innovation and competition
in the software industry whilst also fully recognizing
the importance of intellectual property rights as
incentives for innovation. The decision also made clear
that bundling into the Windows operating system of
software products otherwise available on a stand-alone
basis had the effect of excluding competitors, thereby
leading to reduced consumer choice liable to reduce
access to innovative products.
Background
Work group server operating systems are operating
systems running on central network computers that
provide services to office workers around the world in
their day-to-day work, such as file and printer sharing,
security and user identity management. The Commission
decision ordered Microsoft to disclose to competitors
interoperability information, which would allow
non-Microsoft work group servers to achieve full
interoperability with Windows PCs and servers - that is
to say for their servers to be able to "communicate"
seamlessly with the ubiquitous Windows OS. Microsoft
was also required to offer a version of its Windows OS
without Windows Media Player. On
June 7, 2004, Microsoft
filed an application with the CFI for annulment of this decision.
For further comments by Commissioner Kroes, please see:
http://ec.europa.eu/commission_barroso/kroes/index_en.html.
See also
http://ec.europa.eu/comm/competition/antitrust/cases/microsoft/
and
http://www.eurunion.org/newsweb/HotTopics/Microsoft.htm
for complete chronologies of the case.
Further Contact Information
Press and Public Diplomacy
Delegation of the European Commission
2300 M Street, NW
Washington, DC 20037
http://www.eurunion.org/PressRoom
Tel: 202-862-9552
Fax: 202-429-1766
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