EU Court Upholds Microsoft Antitrust Fines

a_n_d_e_r_s writes "The ongoing saga of Microsoft's misuse of their dominant position in the EU marketplace to block competitors may be finally over, with the fine set to 860 million euros (just over 1 billion dollars). In 2004 Microsoft was ordered to provide certain information to competitors but failed to do so and was given an hefty fine. Now the EU General Court in Luxembourg has upheld the EU Commission decision and ruled against Microsoft." This is a minor reduction (4.3%) of the original fine because of a minor technicality. Microsoft, naturally, is unhappy with the result.

Comments

"Microsoft, naturally, is unhappy with the result"

[hcs_$reboot]

Not sure about that. Since 2004 they sold at least a billion pricey products ; that makes a pretty juicy ROI.

Re:EU bailout

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, how horrible of a European court to exact a fine in European currency. This is almost on par with Iran allowing trading oil in other currencies than US dollars!

Re:"Microsoft, naturally, is unhappy with the resu

[cgenman]

Microsoft has to report that they're unhappy with the result. They have to whine and complain. If they didn't, it wouldn't be seen as sufficient punishment.

Re:"Microsoft, naturally, is unhappy with the resu

[gstrickler]

Microsoft's competitors and consumers aren't too happy with the result either. I'm sure they would have preferred that MS not have engaged in such practices in the first place.

Re:EU bailout

[Anonymous Coward]

Rubbish.

Microsoft has been a predatory ruthless monopolist in all jurisdictions they trade in.

If it wasn't for lobbying/bribes, they'd have been prosecuted in just about every country in the world.

Re:EU bailout

[TheRaven64]

The thing is that the EU courts do nothing domestically, but boy, when they see a US company, it is no holds barred

Bullshit. The largest antitrust fine to date: €992M, on a cartel of lift makers within the EU. The difference is that the myopic US press doesn't bother covering anything other than fines on US companies, so you don't hear about them.