The European Commission is likely to initiate an investigation into Microsoft’s violation of competition regulations as it has not offered an adequate solution for integrating the messaging application into Office, informed sources said.
The EC has already imposed €2.2 billion in fines on Microsoft over the past decade, and it may now reopen an investigation due to a complaint from the messaging application Slack, owned by Salesforce, from 2020.
Slack claims that Microsoft unfairly included the Teams application for workplace conversations in the Office package. The company did not respond to a Reuters inquiry for comment on this information on Monday.
Microsoft added Teams for free to Office 365 in 2017, and the application eventually replaced Skype for Business. Since 2022, they have been in discussions with the European Commission to prevent an investigation and recently offered a price reduction for Office that does not include the Teams application.
The European Commission believes that the price difference will ensure a level playing field for competitors and provide greater choice for consumers, but it has requested that the price of Office without Teams be even lower, the source said. The Commission declined to comment on this information.
– We continue to cooperate with the Commission in the investigation and are open to pragmatic solutions that address its concerns and respect user needs – said a Microsoft spokesperson.
Microsoft could still improve its proposal and prevent the investigation. If the Commission finds that it has violated regulations, it can impose a fine of up to 10% of global revenue.
