Google will join the European Union antitrust case and register a complaint against Microsoft. Google considers that Microsoft is unfair and sidelining its competitors. The case would be filed against Internet Explorer.
The European Union initiated the complaint in January. The case was filed against Microsoft blaming that it is trying to link up Internet Explorer with Windows and trying to suppress the growth of the browser market;. This had taken place early this month. Now, Google has as well decided to join the European Union with regard to this case. Mr. Sundar Pichai, vice president for product management, has mentioned in the Google Blog that, “Google believes that the browser market is still largely uncompetitive, which holds back innovation for users, This is because Internet Explorer is tied to Microsoft’s dominant computer operating system, giving it an unfair advantage over other browsers.”
Google, being a participant in the case would be able to gain access to all the confidential statements that the European Union has charged Microsoft with. Google is also expected to argue in this case about all its complaints and preferred remedies.
Microsoft said in January, when the case was first initiated by the European Union that it had not yet completely analyzed the complaint statement that has been drafted by the European Union. Later, when Microsoft completed its study on the statement of objection, it said that the Commission was threatening. Now it had declined to speak anything about the Google’s announcement about their participation in this case.
As Microsoft had already been expecting other competitive browsers to join the case, it would not be surprising for them to know that Google has become an active participant in the charge sheet. However, the timing at which this instance has been started can be called perfect and this has taken place when the market share values of Microsoft’s competitive search browsers are higher.
Talking to the media about the case, Mr. Samuel R. Miller, a partner at Sidley Austin in San Francisco has said, “This new complaint is not necessary and actually seems like it is instigated to protect particular competitors rather than the competitive process.” He has said that the Microsoft’s browser has completely changed over the years.
Though this is not the first time that these two giants of the IT industry, Microsoft and Google, are on the opposite sides arguing on something, there is still an eagerness in the industry to know on what would happen. Google had already complained in 2006 to the Justice Department and to the European Union saying that Microsoft is trying to divert all the users to its own search service. However, the Justice Department had announced that the design of the browser of Microsoft does not pose to be any competitive to other browsers.