Imagine a situation, where a potential
Personal Computer (PC)
buyer is asked to choose the application
software (for example, office
productivity tools, media player,
Internet explorer, etc.) he would like
to have along with the Windows Operating
System. This might soon become
a reality for European PC consumers,
thanks largely to the European
Commission’s (EC) Competition
Department’s ruling, which added another
legal tussle to the software giant
Microsoft, the most feared company in
the industry. The motive behind the
ruling was to tame Microsoft, alleged
to have tried to take advantage of its
monopoly position in one market for
destroying competition in other adjacent
markets.
It all started in 1998, when Sun
Microsystems lodged a complaint
with EC alleging that Microsoft is trying
to kill competition in the server
market by not sharing code from its
PC operating systems, thus making
life difficult for Sun and other players.
During their investigations, the EC
officials further came up with anotherissue where Microsoft attracted antitrust
laws. This time the allegation
was that Microsoft was trying to extend
its monopoly into the media
player market, by incorporating its
Windows Media Player software. This
was a significant move on the part of
Microsoft as 95% of PCs operate on
Windows Operating System. Thus, rival
firms in the media player software
like Real Networks were at an obvious
disadvantage.
The Commission, not agreeing to
the company’s argument that support
for playing of audio and video is part
of the core functionality of Windows,
has in a landmark ruling on March
24, 2004, imposed a fine of €497 mn
($612 mn). The Commission further
ordered the company to produce a
Windows package that excludes Windows
Media Player within 90 days
and also ordered that it must make
available a chunk of code for Windows
within 120 days, so that rival server
manufacturers can design network
computers that will work smoothly
with the 90%-plus of PCs that run on
Windows Operating System. |
