European Union regulators fined Microsoft \u20ac280.5 million, $357.3 million, on Wednesday for defying a 2004 antitrust ruling, and warned the company to comply or face bigger fines from next month.<\/p>\n
The tough new penalty is the first of its kind and comes on top of a record \u20ac497 million fine the Commission imposed in its landmark antitrust decision against Microsoft in March 2004.<\/p>\n
“Microsoft has still not put an end to its illegal conduct. I have no alternative but to levy penalty payments for this continued non-compliance,” Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said. “No company is above the law.”<\/p>\n
The fine covers a period from December 16 to June 20 and was computed by multiplying 187 days of violations at 1.5 million euros per day. It fell short of a possible maximum 2 million euros per day.<\/p>\n
Full story can be read at the IHT web site<\/a>.<\/p>\n You can browse some of my entries, e.g. this one<\/a>, or this one<\/a> for older comments on the issue of Microsoft. The lost of value of the company is because their business model is wrong. And it becomes even worse, when they are under pressure – be that from competition or from governments.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" European Union regulators fined Microsoft \u20ac280.5 million, $357.3 million, on Wednesday for defying a 2004 antitrust ruling, and warned the company to comply or face bigger fines from next month. The tough new penalty is the first of its kind … Continue reading