Microsoft is already appealing the Commission ruling
that imposed the obligation in the first place.
The long-running battle between Microsoft and the Commission
dates back to 1998 when the Commission began an investigation into
alleged anti-competitive behaviour by the company.
Matters came to a head in March 2004, when the Commission found
Microsoft guilty of breaking competition law, ruling that the
software giant had leveraged its near monopoly in the market for PC
operating systems onto the markets for work group server operating
systems and for media players.
As a sanction, the Commission ordered Microsoft to disclose to
competitors the interfaces required for their products to be able
to "talk" with the ubiquitous Windows operating system.
Microsoft was also required to offer an alternative
stripped-down version of Windows to PC manufacturers and when
selling directly to end users and it was fined €497 million for
abusing its market dominance in the EU.
Microsoft paid the fine into an escrow account in July 2004,
where it will be held until its appeal against the ruling has been
resolved – a process that could take up to five years to
complete.
The company also asked for a delay in the imposition of
sanctions, pending the resolution of the antitrust appeal, but the
Court of First Instance rejected this in January. Despite this, and
despite the threat of fines from the Commission, Microsoft did not
provide details of how it planned to implement the remaining
sanctions until June this year.
Stripped-down versions of Windows are now available for purchase
in the EU although, according to reports, they are not selling
well. Questions still remain as to how Microsoft will provide
competitors with the specifications (but not the source code) for
its client-to-server and server-to-server communications
protocols.
The question of open source accessibility to the code has proved
a sticking point in the negotiations.
Microsoft reckons that the software source code developed by
recipients of the interoperability information should not be
published under an open source licence.
However, the Commission considers that, if the Court of First
Instance rules in favour of the Commission in Microsoft's appeal
against the Commission's antitrust finding, this should be possible
for the protocols that do not embody innovations.
Microsoft disagrees. According to reports, it fears that the
open source issue will be subsumed in the overall context of the
antitrust appeal. Last month it therefore filed another suit
against the Commission to cover that specific point.
"This filing is the result of the agreement reached with the
Commission in June to put this particular issue to the court for
guidance and to avoid any further delay in the process," a
Microsoft spokesman told Reuters.
"We are taking this step so the court can begin its review of
this issue now, given its far-reaching implications for the
protection of our intellectual property rights around the world,"
he added.
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