Luxembourg, 27/04/2006 (Agence Europe) - Before the Court of First Instance of the European Union, the European Commission, Microsoft and their respective experts, lawyers and witnesses supporting one side or the other, continue to try to convince the European judges: on Thursday, their battles focused mainly on the interoperability between Windows servers and the servers of rival systems. The European Commission started off the morning's work by repeating its view that Microsoft is trying to give the impression "that there is no problem at all ", and that "all interoperabilities work". The Commission argues that Microsoft's line of conduct involves a reduction in its supply levels, with a risk of removing competition, a negative effect on technical development and harmful to the consumer. Microsoft contests this (see also EUROPE 9179).
The President of Samba Team, Andrew Tridgell, spoke on behalf of the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE), one of the parties taking part alongside the Commission: "businesses and public authorities have to pay prices that are kept high by Microsoft's refusal to share interoperability information with its competitors as is common practice in the industry". "Microsoft keeps claiming that it was asked to share its source code with its competitors, which is absurd", he added. In the view of the President of the FSFE, Georg Greve, Microsoft should "stop playing games with the Commission and the Court " and leave free scope for innovation.
Professor William Bishop, economics professor and adviser to the European Committee for Interoperable Systems (ECIS) and to the Software and Information Industry Association (SIIA), focused on the economic aspects of operability. He stated that "competition in workgroup server operating systems is being confined to a shrinking fringe". In the view of Ronald Alepin, who has worked as a consultant of over 35 years and who is in charge of technology for the Fujitsu Software Corporation, compared the fact of wanting to clone a Windows product on the basis of available specifications is like "trying to solve the Sunday Times crossword puzzle given only one clue". "We do not want to be Microsoft's twin, we want to be their competitor", said Andrew Tridgell of FSFE.
After several addresses by the Commission and Microsoft, the Irish judge John Cook- the juge rapporteur who inherited this case just a few months ago, after it had been removed from Judge Legal (EUROPE 9030)- admitted that the problem was a complex one, stating that he would like to clarify his "understanding of the technical problems" by putting some questions to the Commission- Anthony Whelan - and to Microsoft- Ian Forrester- on interoperability. The first questions appeared to take Anthony Whelan by surprise, who wanted to refocus the judge's questions ("you are anticipating me", Mr Cook replied). The two lawyers and James Flynn, lawyer to SIIA, in turn admitted that the technical issues were beyond them and that they had to refer them to technicians. A battle of the experts ensued.
In its decision of March 2004, the Commission ordered Microsoft to divulge complete and specific documentation on the Windows interfaces, in order to ensure complete operability between rival workgroup servers and Windows PCs and servers. Microsoft maintains that all of the required information is covered by its intellectual property rights and patents, and that there is effective competition on the workgroup servers market.
The Computing Technology Industry Association, which counts 16,000 members, 200 of which are based in Europe, was one of the most active witnesses in Microsoft's favour. Forcing Microsoft to reveal its "secret" technology to its competitors would undermine the dynamism of an open market, said one of its directors, Hugo Lueders.