{"id":548383,"date":"2006-03-29T18:04:33","date_gmt":"2006-03-29T18:04:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8888\/wordpress\/technology\/548383-eu-warns-microsoft-about-new-operating-system.html"},"modified":"2006-03-29T18:04:33","modified_gmt":"2006-03-29T18:04:33","slug":"eu-warns-microsoft-about-new-operating-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/technology\/548383-eu-warns-microsoft-about-new-operating-system.html","title":{"rendered":"EU warns Microsoft about new operating system"},"content":{"rendered":"

Microsoft has long been embroiled in an anti-trust standoff with the EU’s competition watchdog but so far the dispute has not focused on products in development.<\/font> <\/p>\n

In a new twist to the row, the competition commissioner sent Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer a letter on March 20 containing a "simple warning" about Vista rather than something more formal, spokesman Jonathan Todd said. <\/font><\/p>\n

"We expect that Microsoft will design Vista in a way which is in line with European competition laws," Kroes told the Wall Street Journal in an interview published today. <\/font><\/p>\n

"It would be rather stupid to design something that is not," she added. <\/font><\/p>\n

The newspaper said that Kroes? letter had warned Microsoft that it would not be allowed to sell Vista if it came with features such as internet-search software included in it. <\/font><\/p>\n

The commission is already at pains to force Microsoft to respect a March 2004 anti-trust ruling, in which the company was fined 497.0 million euros ($590m) for abusing its dominant market position. <\/font><\/p>\n

Microsoft was ordered to sell a version of its widely used Windows operating system unbundled from its Media Player software and to divulge information on its operating system needed by manufacturers of rival products. <\/font><\/p>\n

Brussels has grown increasingly impatient for evidence that Microsoft will comply and in December threatened to slap a fine, back-dated to December 15, of up to two million euros a day on the company. <\/font><\/p>\n

In February a group of Microsoft’s rivals, including technology giants such as IBM, Nokia, Oracle and Sun Microsystems, opened a new front against the software behemoth by filing a new complaint with EU anti-trust regulators. <\/font><\/p>\n

The group raised competition concerns not only over "Microsoft’s existing monopolies" but as well over plans to "extend its market dominance into a range of existing and pre-announced future product areas". <\/font><\/p>\n

Amid growing concerns about Vista, a Microsoft spokesman in Brussels said: "Consumers are demanding a more secure and functional operating system and Microsoft has designed vista to respond to that demand while respecting its legal responsibilities." <\/font><\/p>\n

Earlier this month Microsoft said that it was pushing back the debut of its much-heralded Vista operating system until January, which means that the launch will miss out on the key end-of-year holiday sales. <\/font><\/p>\n

Inet-Bridge ||<\/em>\u00a0 <\/font>Discuss this article<\/font><\/a> <\/font><\/p>\n

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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

European Union (EU) competition chief Neelie Kroes has written to Microsoft to warn the US software giant to respect anti-trust law with its new Vista operating system, her spokesman said today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-548383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/548383"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=548383"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/548383\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=548383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=548383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=548383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}