Providing Microsoft’s Communication Product Teams an Unprejudiced Advantage: The European Commission’s Impact on Software Competition and the Outlook for Slack

“We are concerned that Microsoft may be giving its own communication product Teams an undue advantage over competitors, by tying it to its popular productivity suites for businesses,” says Margrethe Vestager, the head of competition policy in Europe. If confirmed, Microsoft’s conduct would be against our rules. Microsoft now has the opportunity to reply to our concerns.”

If Microsoft and the EU can not reach an agreement, the commission can impose fines of up to 10 percent of the company’s annual worldwide turnover.

If Microsoft is found guilty of antitrust violations, the firm could face a fine of up to 10 percent of the company’s annual worldwide turnover. The remedies the European Commission could impose on Microsoft are similar to those they had in the past.

In 2004 the European Commission ordered Microsoft to offer a version of Windows without Media Player bundled, which resulted in a Windows XP N version available only in EU markets. In 2009 Microsoft was also forced to implement a browser ballot box in its Windows operating system to ensure users were presented with a choice of web browsers, after years of Microsoft bunding Internet Explorer with Windows. Microsoft was fined $730 million for not including the browser ballot in Windows 7.

At the peak of the global epidemic, Microsoft was accused of abusing it’s dominance in the business-software market at the expense of smaller rivals.

On Tuesday, Sabastian Niles, president and chief legal officer of Slack’s parent company Salesforce, described the European Commission’s position as “a win for customer choice and an affirmation that Microsoft’s practices with Teams have harmed competition.”