Microsoft asks EU Court to overturn, reduce 899 million euro anti-trust fine

Posted May 10, 2008 at 02:48 PM by Arnold Zafra

Section: News, Web

$899 million euros or $1.4 billion is definitely a huge sum of money and it seems like Microsoft would not just want to lose that amount over an anti-trust ruling that the EU has slapped Microsoft in February 2007. The fine was a result of a case filed against Microsoft for failing to comply with a 2004 ruling. So, Microsoft is appealing the EU ruling and hoping against all hopes that the EU would heed its plea to overturn the ruling or at least reduce the fine.

If you recall, sometime in 2004, the EU slapped Microsoft with a $768 million fine after it failed to comply with an anti-trust ruling that ordered Microsoft to provide rival companies with data that would allow their servers to connect to the Windows platform which was the predominantly used operating systems in majority of the PCs in 2004. In return, Microsoft is allowed to charge reasonable royalties for giving rival companies access to its Windows Platform.

Microsoft followed the order after getting the $768 million euros fine, but the EU later found out that the company has overcharged its rival companies for the patent licenses they need to connect to Microsoft’s produces. This prompted the EU to raise Microsoft’s fine to around $2.5 billion.

Should Microsoft’s appeal for reconsideration gets denied, the ant-trust case will add up to another similar legal issue it is battling against the EU, relating to its word processing and spreadsheets products, as well as an issue on the Internet Explorer being unlawfully tied up with the Windows OS.

Well, it seems like Microsoft has made the right decision on withdrawing its acquisition for Yahoo. It could certainly use the money it promises to pay for Yahoo if it accepted the buyout offer, for paying up its legal obligations.

Read [Bloomberg]