Microsoft seeks to dodge EU cloud computing probe with changes

Microsoft will help cloud providers to offer Windows and Office directly as part of a complete desktop solution that they can build on, sell and host on their infrastructure.

Microsoft will revise its licensing deals and make it easier for cloud service providers to compete, its president Brad Smith said on Wednesday, as the U.S. software giant sought to dodge a lengthy EU antitrust probe into its cloud computing business.

(Sign up to our Technology newsletter, Today’s Cache, for insights on emerging themes at the intersection of technology, business and policy. Click here to subscribe for free.)

Microsoft was fined 1.6 billion euros ($1.7 billion) by EU antitrust regulators in the previous decade for various violations.

The company found itself under the EU competition body’s scrutiny again after German software provider NextCloud, France’s OVHcloud, Italian cloud service provider Aruba and a Danish association of cloud service providers complained to the European Commission about Microsoft’s cloud practices. 

Microsoft was taking the first step, but not the last, to address the concerns, Smith told a conference organised by think tank Bruegel in Brussels.

He recounted the "extraordinary defeat" that Microsoft had faced in a challenge to the EU antitrust body in 2007 that had forced it to embrace change "which is a lot more fun than like knocking heads".

Microsoft wants to listen and act on the complaints, Smith said.