Brussels, 22/12/2005 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday evening, the Commission decided to send a statement of objections to Microsoft reproaching it for not having complied with its obligations regarding interoperability. The information provided by Microsoft on this point is “incomplete and inaccurate”, Neelie Kroes' spokesman said on Thursday, waiting for Microsoft to apply the decision of March 2004 and not its own interpretation of the decision. The US firm has five weeks in which to respond and request an oral hearing, the spokesman added, specifying that, if the Commission is not pleased, it may impose penalties on the company of up to EUR 2 million per day. “I have given Microsoft every opportunity to comply with its obligations. However, I have been left with no alternative other than to proceed via the formal route to ensure Microsoft's compliance”, the Competition Commissioner deplores in a press release.
It is true that the matter has been dragged out since the decision of 24 March 2004 (EUROPE 8673), when the Commission had imposed a fine of EUR 497 million on Microsoft, also forcing it to suggest a version for its Windows system without any connection to its Media Player and to disclose complete and accurate interface documentation allowing non-Microsoft work group servers to achieve full interoperability with Windows PCs and servers. Since the Court of First Instance rejected Microsoft's request to suspend such measures in December 2004 (EUROPE 8854), the Commission has repeated the exchanges held with the firm and the sector as a whole, stepped up the inquiries and the market tests and pressed Microsoft to cooperate fully and earnestly. On 10 November, the Commission ordered the company to provide adequate and complete specifications for 15 December at reasonable and non-discriminatory conditions for its competitors. After having received a new version of the documentation amended by Microsoft, the Commission has therefore concluded that the information presented was inadequate.
Appointed in October as the person responsible for providing technical opinions on compliance with the March 2004 decision by the American company, Professor Neil Barrett, a computer science specialist, forwarded an impartial technical report to the Commission, on which the Commission based its argument. The report concludes that: “Any programmer or programming team seeking to use the Technical Documentation for a real development exercise would be wholly and completely unable to proceed on the basis of the documentation. The Technical Documentation is therefore totally unfit at this stage for its intended purpose”. Mr Barrett also stipulates that “the documentation appears to be fundamentally flawed in its conception, and in its level of explanation and detail … Overall, the process of using the documentation is an absolutely frustrating, time-consuming and ultimately fruitless task. The documentation needs quite drastic overhaul before it could be considered workable”.
The time allowed to Microsoft for submitting its response took effect from 21 December and runs until 25 January 2006, given the end of year festive season, but the constraints could be retroactive in their effect. “We told Microsoft we intend to impose daily fines” with effect on 15 December (the date assigned for forwarding adequate and complete information), the spokesman said. “At this stage, the information is insufficient to allow any operator to ensure that their work group servers are compatible with Microsoft products”, he asserted, pending the answer from the Redmond firm.
The warning addressed to Microsoft on the question of interoperability is, however, not the only element in the matter on which the Commission is still working. From the interoperability point of view, the Commission has still to examine the financial terms on the basis of which Microsoft is ready to provide the information, the spokesman said, adding that, if the royalties requested are not reasonable, the Commission may send a statement of additional objections. Regarding Media Player, the competition services follow application of the remedy but have not yet adopted any conclusions in this respect.