Microsoft has avoided an EU fine after the US tech group offered concessions on how it packages together its Teams and Office products, ending a long-running antitrust investigation by the bloc’s regulators.
The probe, which began after a 2020 complaint from Slack, now part of Salesforce, accused Microsoft of abusing its market dominance by tying its video conferencing tool to its widely used suite of productivity applications.
Since the initial complaint, Microsoft has unbundled Teams from Office 365 in the EU, but critics said the changes were too narrow.
In May, the $3.7 trillion software giant promised concessions, such as continuing the Teams and Office separation for seven years.
After a market test, Microsoft has since made additional commitments, such as publishing more information on so-called “interoperability” or the ability to use its products with others made by rivals.
These new pledges have satisfied the EU’s regulator, which said on Friday that it helped to restore fair competition and open the market to other providers.
