Agencies_Gaza Post
EU antitrust investigators are questioning Microsoft’s (MSFT.O) competitors and customers about its cloud business and licensing relationships, a step that may lead to a formal probe and renewed scrutiny of the US software giant according to a questionnaire seen by Reuters.
In the previous decade, the European Commission fined Microsoft a total of 1.6 billion euros ($1.8 billion) for breaking EU antitrust regulations and failing to comply with its order to stop anticompetitive conduct.
After German software supplier NextCloud, France’s OVHcloud (OVH.PA), and two other companies filed complaints about Microsoft’s cloud operations, the corporation was once again on the EU competition enforcer’s radar.
Microsoft’s licensing agreements with cloud service providers are being scrutinized by regulators to see if they allow competitors to compete successfully.
They also want to know if enterprises needed Microsoft’s operating systems and productivity programs to compete effectively with their own cloud infrastructure offering.
Companies were also questioned about the discrepancies in license costs and commercial terms between cloud service provider licensing deals and another program in which they package and resell Microsoft’s cloud services alongside their own.
