EU fines Microsoft record $1.4bn

According to BBC

The European Commission has fined US computer giant Microsoft for defying sanctions imposed on it for anti-competitive behaviour.

Microsoft must now pay a record 899 million euros ($1.4bn; £680.9m) after it failed to comply with a 2004 ruling that it abused its position.

The ruling said that Microsoft was guilty of not providing key code to rival software makers.

EU regulators said the firm was the first to break an EU antitrust ruling.

The fines come on top of earlier fines of 280m euros imposed in July 2006, and of 497m euros n March 2004.

"Microsoft was the first company in 50 years of EU competition policy that the Commission has had to fine for failure to comply with an antitrust decision," Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said in a statement.

Future improvements?

An investigation concluded in 2004 that Microsoft was guilty of freezing out rivals in products such as media players, while unfairly unfairly linking its Explorer internet browser to its Windows operating system at the expense of rival servers.

The European Court of First Instance upheld this ruling last year, which ordered Microsoft to pay 497 million euros for abusing its dominant market position.


Dispute timeline
March 2004: EU fines Microsoft 497 million euros and orders it to release key Windows code to rival software developers
September 2004: Microsoft tries to have the ruling temporarily suspended
April 2006: Microsoft appeals the ruling in the European Court of First Instance
September 2007: Microsoft loses its appeal

Last week, the firm announced that it would open up the technology of some of its leading software, including Windows, to make it easier to operate with rivals' products.

"As we demonstrated last week with our new interoperability principles and specific actions to increase the openness of our products, we are focusing on steps that will improve things for the future," Microsoft said.

Further cases

But the firm is still being pursued by Brussels.

Earlier this month, the European Commission launched two new anti-competition investigations against Microsoft into similar issues.

The first will look at whether there are still problems regarding Microsoft abusing its dominance of the PC market to grab market share of the internet.

The Commission will also investigate the continued interoperability of Microsoft software with rival products.

more details: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7266629.stm

 

So who gets the money?

 

This is weird bro 1.4 Billion is hugeeeeee

 

wow, thats alot, not much to microsoft though.

 

By failing to comply they probably made more, clever mover really if it worked out for MS.

 

Wait,microsoft is in america, so y are they paying europe?

 

they are jealous of MS

 

Because MS sells its products in Europe as well

 

Yeah go EU!!!

 

Any fine that is imposed to a company due to questionable practices doesn't necessarily mean it will be paid.

 

That's got to hurt Microsofts bottom line. $1.4bn is no small amount even for them.

 

They still have to sell their product in the European Union.

If it's the EU trust me it will get paid, unless Microsoft don't want business on that side of the river anymore, which wouldn't be a good idea really .

Nah, I personally think MS would of knew what they were doing, it was most probably business tactics, by doing this they probably took over more of the market share and made the fine in sales.

 

Exactly .

 

This is small change for Microsoft I guess.

 

1,4 billion is TWO WEEKS operating capital for Microsoft...not much..

and it is funny that the part of the EU complaint was that Microsoft had the price TOO HIGH thus preventing competition...WHAT??????

 

It's a lot of money, for sure.

 

I really do think this fine is unfair.

Why should microsoft have to share code to competitors? I think that's just silly.

They spent money, hard time and a lot of effort to get the code working, for them to be forced to give it to a competitor who has to do nothing? Well that's no on.