Microsoft Charged by EU for Breaching Antitrust Rules

Microsoft is under fire from the European Union (EU) for allegedly violating antitrust rules by bundling its Teams app with other business applications. If proven, the tech giant could face a fine of up to 10% of its annual global revenue, which amounted to $211 billion last year.

The European Commission claims that Microsoft has been "restricting competition" by integrating Teams with Office 365 and Microsoft 365. This investigation followed a 2020 complaint by Slack, now owned by Salesforce, alleging that Microsoft had unfairly given Teams a competitive edge.

The Commission preliminarily finds that Microsoft has been tying Teams with its core SaaS productivity applications since at least April 2019, thereby restricting competition and preserving its leading market position. Even though in July 2023, Microsoft made some changes in the way it distributes Teams, including starting to provide select suites without Teams included, the Commission stated that "these changes are insufficient to address its concerns and that more changes to Microsoft's conduct are necessary to restore competition."

This comes shortly after the EU accused Apple of breaching its Digital Markets Act. And this case represents yet another challenge that US tech giants are facing from the EU. 

You can read the report on this news from PC Gamer here and the Statement of Objections from European Commision can be found here. 

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