Feeling the pressure
The European Commission (EC) sent a statement of objections to Microsoft last January concerning the bundling of its Internet Explorer (IE) browser with its Windows operating system.
In February, the company with the most overt vested interest in curtailing IE - Mozilla, which makes rival browser Firefox - generously offered its help in the case. Then two weeks later Google - not known for its affection towards Microsoft - decided to muck in as well.
Today the consensus against Microsoft grew significantly with the addition of the European Committee for Interoperable Systems (ECIS), a non-profit organisation founded in 1989 that claims to do what it says on the tin, as an ‘interested third party' in the case.
A quick look at its membership list reveals IBM, Oracle, Nokia, Adobe and Opera among others, so that makes a pretty heavyweight list of companies now ganging up on Microsoft.
"This is an important case to ensure that browsers can compete on the merits and that consumers have a true choice in the software they use to access the World Wide Web. Smaller, more innovative browser developers need a level playing field. That is why there is such broad support for the Commission's preliminary findings of abuse," said Thomas Vinje, partner at Clifford Chance and ECIS Spokesman.
Vinje had welcomed the move on behalf of ECIS back in January and on 31 March ECIS published a document entitled ‘Microsoft - A History of Anticompetitive Behavior and Consumer Harm', but this is the first time it has offered its material help to the EC.
