BRUSSELS (Reuters) – EU antitrust regulators opened an investigation into Microsoft’s tying of its chat and video app Teams with its Office product, saying that this could be anti-competitive.
The move by the European Commission followed a complaint by Salesforce-owned workspace messaging app Slack in 2020 and after the U.S. tech giant’s offer of remedies failed to address the EU competition enforcer’s concerns.
“The Commission is concerned that Microsoft may be abusing and defending its market position in productivity software by restricting competition in the European Economic Area for communication and collaboration products,” the Commission said in a statement.
A spokesperson for Microsoft said Microsoft would continue to co-operate with the European Commission and that the company remained committed to finding solutions to address the Commission’s concerns.
Reuters reported earlier this month that the EU antitrust watchdog was set to open a probe after Microsoft declined to offer bigger price cuts on its Office without Teams.
(Reporting by Foo Yun Chee; Editing by Sudip Kar-Gupta)
