Microsoft hopeful December will see suspension of EU antitrust ruling

A decision on whether to suspend the EU antitrust ruling against
Microsoft will be taken between 18 and 20 December.

The testimonies brought against Microsoft by Novell and the
Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA) will be
maintained despite the two backing off earlier this month from an
EU antitrust case against the software giant.

In March this year, the European Commission had imposed a record
fine of €497 million and a series of ‘remedies’ upon Microsoft for
abuse of dominant position on the software market with its Windows
operating system (see EURACTIV,  25 March 2004).

Bo Vesterdorf, the judge in charge of the case at the EU Court
of First Instance, had convened a closed door meeting with all the
parties on 25 November to discuss the situation after the CCIA and
Novell withdrew from the case. They concluded that the evidence
would be maintained.

“All the parties in the meeting agreed, as Microsoft has always
maintained, that CCIA and Novell’s past testimony should remain on
the record,” Tom Brookes, a spokesman for Microsoft said.

Brookes said he did not expect the agreement to have much
influence on Microsoft’s hopes to obtain a suspension of the
Commission’s landmark antitrust ruling rendered in March.

However, he pointed out that, unlike a previous settlement with
Sun Microsystems, the November settlement with Novell did not
contain a mutual technology transfer agreement. This, he told
EURACTIV, would indicate that there is “not much urgency” from
industry to force Microsoft into disclosing part of the source code
contained in its Windows operating system to its competitors.

“That’s when it becomes clear that, on interoperability, there
is no industry support for the Commission’s case,” he told
EURACTIV.

RealNetworks and the Free Software Foundation are now the only
allies left to the Commission after Microsoft paid €497 million to
Novell and an undisclosed amount to the CCIA to withdraw their
support on 8 November.

The sanctions imposed on Microsoft had been temporarily lifted
in June pending a decision by the EU Court of First Instance on
whether to suspend the ruling until a final judgement is rendered
(see EURACTIV, 28 June 2004). 

Vesterdorf is expected to submit his decision on whether to
suspend the ruling before Christmas, probably between 18 and 20
December, officials indicated.

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