The EU remains turning up the heat on US tech giants.
European regulators hit Microsoft (MSFT) with an antitrust expense Tuesday, one day after the same regulatory body charged Apple (AAPL) with violating European Union competition regulations.
The European Commission (EC), the EU’s antitrust authority, said it informed Microsoft of its thinking level about that the tech giant had been illegally bundling — or “tying” — its Teams software to other proprietary work software, including Office 365 and Microsoft 365.
Tying the software apps together, according to the EC, against the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), which restrict abuse of dominant market positions.
Charges for violations can run up to 10% of a organization’s worldwide yearly revenue. For Microsoft, worldwide sale in 2023 totaled $212 billion.
Microsoft president Brad Smith said the organization has already untethered Teams from some of its other software application.
“We appreciate the extra clarity given today and will work to search solutions to address the commission‘s remaining concerns,” he added.
It even chalked up some early successes. In 2001, its antitrust stance doomed a $42 billion proposed merger between GE and Honeywell, even though that market union had gained approval in the US.
In 2007, it gained broad environmental legislation that pushed chemical authorities around the world to adhere to new restrictions.
In more recent years, the EU’s attempt to rein in tech giants has become a core focus. The EU’s first main tech legislation, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), went into impact in 2018.
It is designed to safe user privacy and security and imposes obligations on organizations anywhere in the globe as long as they “target or gather data related to people in the EU.”
Microsoft will now have an chance to offer its own evidence in response to the objections before the EC problems a last decision on whether or not the bloc’s antitrust laws were breached.
The EC’s last determinations are handled through administrative prcess without a test. However, appeals from the Commission’s last determination can be made to the European Court of Justice.