Microsoft awaits June response to its challenge to €899m EU fine
Computer giant breached earlier order by overcharging for licences
Brussels: Microsoft Corp will next month hear the result of its European Union court challenge over an €899 million (Dh4.18 billion) penalty for failing to comply with an anti-trust decision.
The EU's General Court will rule on June 27 on Microsoft's appeal of fines for breaching an earlier order by overcharging rivals for licences they needed to connect products to Windows computers, according to a filing on the court's website yesterday.
Microsoft is the only company in more than 50 years of EU competition policy to be penalised for failing to comply with an order.
The case is the last remnant of years of disputes with the European Commission that resulted in fines totalling €1.68 billion.
Microsoft agreed in 2009 to settle an anti-trust clash over internet browsers in a bid to repair the company's uneasy relationship with the EU regulator.
The commission, the EU's anti-trust authority, imposed the fine as a so-called periodic penalty payment on Microsoft for failing to comply with a 2004 anti-trust order.
Under the initial decision, Microsoft was fined €497 million and ordered to provide data to competitors to allow servers to connect to computers using its Windows operating system.
The court's ruling can be appealed to the EU's highest tribunal, the European Court of Justice.
