back to article £1B lawsuit targets Microsoft for allegedly overcharging Windows customers on other clouds

Microsoft has been sued in the UK to the tune of more than £1 billion over claims Redmond has been overcharging businesses for Windows Server licenses used on competing cloud platforms.  The lawsuit, filed today with the UK's Competition Appeal Tribunal by competition lawyer Maria Luisa Stasi through the firm Scott+Scott, said …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Cloudy with a chance of rain

    and a lot of that rain will originate in MS's coffers.

    Given their recent example of throwing all sorts of shite onto the wall and hoping, this lawsuit is just another brick in the wall of their downfall.

  2. Yorick Hunt Silver badge

    I don't think so.

    It's easy for Mickey$oft to argue that they weren't charging other customers more - they were simply offering discounts for customers who were also using M$'s cloud.

    It's not as if those customers weren't aware of the prices before clicking on "buy now."

    I have every aspect of Microsoft, but on this particular subject I see no case to answer.

    1. Dinanziame Silver badge

      Re: I don't think so.

      Since this lawsuit is filed to a competition tribunal, I suppose it is arguing that Microsoft is engaging in monopolistic behavior — it's fine to offer discounts to your customer, but not if this effectively shuts off the competition by leveraging your dominant market share in a separate business. This is very much like Microsoft was found guilty for offering Internet Explorer for free with Windows, using the fact that almost everybody buys Windows to get a leg-up in the browser competition.

  3. TechYogJosh

    There is no case

    Companies will bundle and discount their offerings, what is to cry here? When a company delivers broad set of services they can optimize their costs and pass on the benefits to the clients. Most tech vendors do play wrong and Msoft is no exception, but this bundling centric discount and higher price for other cloud, appears to be a legitimate business strategy than something which is legally wrong.

    1. Mike007 Silver badge

      Re: There is no case

      Using market dominance in one area to drive users to your other services is legally very wrong.

      Just like when Google do it.

  4. Guy de Loimbard Silver badge
    Joke

    So... the Stasi are raising a complaint....?

    Depending on your age, this may or may not be funny!

  5. IGotOut Silver badge

    You see MS...

    ...when you settle out of court with one group, it leaves you wide open to be sued again by another.....and another....and another.

  6. sketharaman

    Frivolous Lawsuit

    Since times immemorial, software prices have been denominated by platform e.g. Oracle RDBMS had one price for CISC (Intel, Motorola) and another for RISC (SPARC, HP-PA) servers. What's new here?

  7. Zippy´s Sausage Factory
    Unhappy

    Microsoft will just say "ok fine" and raise the costs on Azure, then say "the court mandated it, sorry" when asked why people's prices have gone up.

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