EU Extends Microsoft-Time Warner Review
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European antitrust regulators said Monday they have extended their review of a deal between Microsoft Corp. and Time Warner Inc. to make anti-piracy software together.
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On 12 July, Microsoft and Time Warner, both US companies, sought clearance under the European Union&#39;s Merger Regulation for plans to jointly acquire ContentGuard.
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European antitrust regulators extend their review of Microsoft-Time Warner deal. Also: Gateway plans to sell desktops at CompUSA & hellip;. Vodafone's Japanese unit headhunts an executive from rival NTT DoCoMo & hellip;. and more.
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(InfoWorld) - The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and Microsoft filed formal paperwork Wednesday to extend part of an antitrust judgment against the company for at least two years. The extension of U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly's November 2002 antitrust settlement would give Microsoft more time to complete work on technical documentation for licensees of its communications protocols. The DOJ and Microsoft filed a joint request Wednesday for Kollar-Kotelly to approve the extension, which the DOJ proposed in May. The antitrust order had been scheduled to expire in November 2007. If the judge approves the two-year extension, the DOJ and 17 state plaintiffs in the antitrust case can ask for an additional three-year extension if they still have complaints about Microsoft documentation. Microsoft has said it will not oppose a second extension. Under the settlement, Microsoft is required to license the communication protocols to other IT vendors interested in developing server software that works with Microsoft's Windows operating system. But as of May, hundreds of bugs in the technical documentation remained. A technical committee working with the antitrust plaintiffs identified 575 bugs in the technical documentation as of Feb. 8. By March 16, Microsoft had whittled the bugs identified by the technical committee down to 307, but the number of high-priority bugs grew from 68 to 71 in that period. By May 8, the number of high-priority bugs with a 60-day deadline grew to 79, and the total number of bugs identified by the technical committee was 414.
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The European Commission has stopped the clock on its review of Microsoft and Time Warner's purchase of U.S. anti-piracy software maker ContentGuard, a spokesman for the EU executive said on Tuesday.
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WASHINGTON - Six states, including Massachusetts, sought a five-year extension of an antitrust court decree imposed on Microsoft Corp. , arguing that continued judicial supervision is needed to prevent the world's largest software company from crushing challenges to its Windows operating system monopoly.
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BRUSSELS -- The European Commission has "stopped the clock" on its antitrust investigation into digital rights management software maker ContentGuard, a joint venture between Microsoft and Time Warner, pending further information on the deal, it announced on Wednesday.
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The bidding process for Alitalia is to be extended by a further ten days amid concerns about the intention of the remaining suitors.
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(InfoWorld) - A group of state plaintiffs in the U.S. Microsoft antitrust case will ask for a five-year extension of a large portion of the 2002 judgment against the company, the group's lawyer said Tuesday. California, Connecticut, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Massachusetts, and the District of Columbia -- known as the "California group" -- want an extension of most of the middleware portions of the judgment, said Stephen Houck, a lawyer for the group. Microsoft still retains a huge lead in the operating system and Web browser markets, he said. "Microsoft continues to have a stranglehold over the two products ... that nearly all consumers use," Houck said during an antitrust compliance hearing in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. "Very little has happened in five years ... in those markets." The California group of states -- the larger of two groups of states that sued Microsoft for antitrust violations -- will ask for an extension of all the middleware portions of the antitrust judgement, except for a section that governs the royalties Microsoft can charge PC manufacturers for the Windows operating system. Most of the antitrust judgment was scheduled to expire in November. Microsoft lawyer Rick Rule said the company would need time to respond to Houck's proposal. Microsoft first heard of the plan to ask for an extension on Friday, he said, and the California group plans to file a formal extension request with the court in mid-October. Rule seemed to suggest Microsoft would fight the five-year extension. U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly declined to impose a 10-year judgment in 2002, he said. "We think the picture of the computer industry is much rosier," Rule added. "We think it's clear that the decree has done its job." Microsoft spokesman Jack Evans said the company will respond in more detail after it has seen the extension request. "We're a bit surprised that a few states are now requestingÂ an extension of the consent decree because they indicated just last month that they're not too fond of it," Evans said. In August 2006, Microsoft already agreed to an extension of the section of the judgment requiring it to make its communications protocols available to other software vendors. Microsoft's efforts to fix technical documentation for the protocols have run into several delays. Houck on Tuesday asked Kollar-Kotelly to extend the communications protocol section of the judgment until 2012. The California group does not "have any confidence" Microsoft will continue to improve the communications protocol program without oversight, Houck said. An independent auditor's report just issued questions whether Microsoft has released all the protocols mandated in the judgment, he added. The California group's extension proposal comes afterÂ the U.S. Department of Justice and the New York group of states filed briefs last month saying the antitrust judgment has done its job. "There have been a number of developments in the competitive landscape ... that suggest that the Final Judgments are accomplishing their stated goal of fostering competitive conditions among middleware products, unimpeded by anticompetitive exclusionary obstacles erected by Microsoft," said the report from the DOJ and New York group, which includes five states. But Houck disputed that assessment on Tuesday. At the time of the judgment, a handful of PC vendors were preinstalling a competing Web browser on PCs, he said. Today, no major ones are, he said. In addition, the communications protocol program was supposed to be finished early in the judgment's life, and its delays have kept software vendors from fully using the program, Houck said. "The whole thing ... doesn't have an opportunity to work as the court intended," he said. "It's very clear that the product markets at issue in this case have not moved rapidly at all." Kollar-Kotelly said she would delay final reports on the judgment while she considers the California group's request. Microsoft and the plaintiffs were scheduled to meet with her Nov. 6 to discuss the final reports, but she will now consider the extension request on that date. Before Houck made his request, the judge said she was opposed to extending the judgment without a good reason. It was hard to predict the impact the judgment would have, she added. "The final chapter of the final judgment has not been written," Kollar-Kotelly said. The California group wants Kollar-Kotelly to extend all of section 3 of the judgment except for section 3B, dealing with manufacturer royalties. The extended provision would include: *Â A prohibition against Microsoft retaliating against PC vendors for including competing software on PCs; *Â A prohibition against Microsoft restricting PC vendors from putting competing middleware in the start menu or making them defaults; *Â A requirement that Microsoft give APIs for its middleware to PC vendors and independent software vendors.
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The European Commission warned  Microsoft  on Thursday it faced further fines in its  long-running antitrust battle with Brussels, this time for  seeking unreasonable prices from software makers for vital  data.
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The Department of Justice and Microsoft Corp. filed court documents to extend the antitrust judgment against the company for at least two years.
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The European Commission plans to open an in-depth, four-month probe of plans by Microsoft Corp. and Time Warner Inc. to acquire joint control of U.S. ContentGuard Holdings Inc., a source close to the situation said on Tuesday.
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MSG Networks and Time Warner Cable agreed yesterday to extend until Jan. 20 negotiations on a new contract to maintain the availability of the MSG Network, Fox Sports New York and the
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The European Commission opens a probe into Microsoft and Time Warner's plans to buy anti-piracy firm ContentGuard.
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The European Commission has again criticized Microsoft's response to a 2004 antitrust ruling, opening up the possibility of further fines for the company. The regulator said that the software giant proposes overcharging for vital interoperability information needed by rival software makers to allow their products work properly with the Windows operating system.
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The Bush administration will extend its review of IBM's  sale of its personal computer business to China's Lenovo Group Ltd. (0992.HK) for 45 days to examine potential national security concerns, sources familiar with the matter said on Friday.
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European Union regulators said Microsoft Corp. handed in on time to meet a Thursday deadline information about its Windows operating software that should help other software companies.