Microsoft Corp. is close to a settlement with a trio of cloud providers to suspend their antitrust complaints to the European Commission, people familiar with the matter said.
(Bloomberg) — Microsoft Corp. is close to a settlement with a trio of cloud providers to suspend their antitrust complaints to the European Commission, people familiar with the matter said.
France’s OVHcloud, Italy’s Aruba SpA and the Danish Cloud Community are in the final stages of settling with Microsoft after complaining last year that the US tech firm’s licensing practices were unfair, the people said, asking not to be identified because the discussions are private.
An announcement, including concrete commitments from Microsoft, could come as soon as this week, they said.
The moves toward agreements with cloud firms coincide with Microsoft’s efforts to convince regulators around the world to approve its $69 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard Inc., publisher of blockbuster game Call of Duty. Watchdogs in the US, UK and European Union have all raised concerns over the deal, though the Japan Fair Trade Commission said on Tuesday the transaction wouldn’t limit competition.
Read More: Microsoft’s Cloud Sparks EU Complaint by Amazon-Linked Group
Microsoft announced plans to change its company’s licensing practices in May 2022 after the competition complaints from OVH, Aruba and the DCC. Microsoft — the maker of market-leading Office and Windows software — is the No. 2 global seller of cloud infrastructure. Amazon.com Inc. is the largest vendor of such services, and Google is trying to catch Microsoft.
“We are grateful for the productive conversations that led us there and appreciate the feedback that we have received since,” a Microsoft spokesperson said. “We are committed to the European cloud community and their success.”
OVH, Aruba and DCC representatives declined to comment on the case. The Brussels-based commission didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
CISPE — a group representing European providers as well as Amazon Web Services — said it plans to continue with its own competition complaint, for now. Secretary General Francisco Mingorance said in a statement that separate, private deals could throw the rest of the cloud market “under the bus” if they do not benefit all companies, including Amazon and Alphabet Inc.’s Google, and customers.
Mingorance said the group is awaiting concrete details from Microsoft about new licensing terms it discussed. So far, he said, there has been no evidence that the company will make changes to what CISPE describes as unfair pricing terms, self-preferencing or the interoperability of services between cloud providers.
Separately Germany’s Federal Cartel Office said on Tuesday that it’s looking at whether Microsoft meets the test to be subject to its strengthened antitrust powers, which would allow the authority to ban certain practices that hamper competition in the online world. The rules lower the threshold usually employed under antitrust law for regulating market-dominant corporations.
According to the Cartel Office statement, Microsoft has continuously expanded its product range, including cloud services. Microsoft said it would “engage constructively with the regulator.”
(Updates with Japanese review of Activision deal in fourth paragraph)
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