Slack complains about Teams follow-up, sources say Microsoft will face EU antitrust investigation

CTOnews.com, January 26, last year it was reported that Microsoft may become a new target of the European Commission (EC) antitrust investigation because of Slack's complaint about Teams. Now, a new report says this will happen, and Microsoft will soon face formal scrutiny.

According to a report from Tu Yuan PexelsPolitico, several EC sources have confirmed that Microsoft will soon face an antitrust investigation into bundling Teams with other Microsoft 365 software. Although details are unclear, regulators are reportedly planning to issue a "statement of objection" to Microsoft's unfair treatment of its competitors in an anti-competitive manner. A spokesman for the European Commission also confirmed that the assessment of the investigation is under way.

CTOnews.com learned that the root cause of the investigation was a complaint filed by Slack in 2020 that Microsoft hid "true costs" when it bundled Teams with the Microsoft 365product suite and forced it to be installed on corporate customer devices. At the time, Slack urged regulators to force Microsoft to remove Teams from its Microsoft suite and offer it separately at a "fair" commercial price. The EU has sent questionnaires to all parties concerned to learn more about the matter.

But now is not a good time for Microsoft to face another antitrust investigation. Microsoft's $69 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard is under scrutiny by some regulators.