Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Loses EU Anti-Trust Appeal
Kugrian writes "Microsoft has lost its appeal against a record 497m euro (£343m; $690m) fine imposed by the European Commission in a long-running competition dispute. The European Court of First Instance upheld the ruling that Microsoft had abused its dominant market position."
They have not yet paid another fine that was imposed on them for not paying this fine, as the BBC article mentions, although in no great depth:
Last year, Microsoft was told to pay daily fines adding up to 280.5 million euros over a six-month period, after it failed to adhere to the 2004 decision. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4552214.stm - another BBC piece specifically about the daily fines. Does anyone know if they've paid them or not by now?The problem for them is not the fine, but instead, from now on, the compliance to the ruling, which will lead them to change the content of Windows software, the parts they will be able to install on new computers. That's a lot more important than money.
Don't forget the ruling is 152-page long, and therefore, they will have to digest and comply with all the court orders to avoid paying even more fine. That may be difficult for them in a market that becomes more competitive.
Won't queue anything here. Anyone who knows a bit about the EU, know that this is bollocks. They go after anyone abusing the market. As Volkswagen, for example... Not a US company at all...
The fines will increase (exponentially I believe) until they pay. The court can freeze and seize their European assets and they have much of their money within the EU in Ireland as a US tax dodge. Also, the EU is by far MS's largest market. Not complying would be a BAD idea.
BTW, the legal detail is over at Groklaw (basically the court sided with the EC except a minor point about the EC giving too much power to the MS appointed monitoring trustee) and there is a joint FSFE/Samba press release. Also, the the court published the full judgement and other court docs.
Joe Llywelyn Griffith Blakesley
[This post is in the public domain (copyright-free) unless otherwise stated]
As for a CD player "bundled" with a car, CD's follow an ISO standard so with all manufacturers following a standard the consumer is completely free to replace the player with another from a different supplier. This means that competition is unhindered so the market can work as intended - the case of providing a CD player with a car is a matter of convenience for the customer not an anticompetitive act.
Shh.
It's ironic that you chose your particular car analogy, because there was a famous USA court ruling that car manufactures could not artificially restrict the ability of third parties to install car radios not supplied by the car manufacturer. USA auto manufacturers tried to force customers to buy radios exclusively from the car manufacturer by using non-standard electrical connections and deliberately restrictive physical constraints. Then the car manufacturers claimed that their physical constraints and connector designs were protected intellectual property.
The fight continues to this day: See the "Right to Repair" act. http://www.aftermarket.org/Government/Government.asp