Judge Orders Microsoft to Pay $112 Million
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SAN FRANCISCO -- A judge is ordering Microsoft Corp. to pay $112.5 million to attorneys who successfully sued the software maker for monopolizing a segment of California&#39;s market.
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A judge is ordering Microsoft Corp. to pay &#36;112.5 million to attorneys who successfully sued the software maker for monopolizing a segment of California's market.
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A U.S. federal jury found that  Microsoft Corp. infringed audio patents held by Alcatel-Lucent  and should pay $1.52 billion in damages, the No. 1 software  maker said on Thursday.
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A federal jury's ruling that Microsoft infringed on two MP3 patents and must pay $1.52 billion in damages could turn into a major sour note for other technology companies
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The European Union Court of First Instance has upheld the US$665.4 million fine on Microsoft imposed by the executive European Commission in March and will now force the company to offer European computer makers a version of the Windows operating system
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(InfoWorld) - Plaintiffs in the U.S. antitrust case against Microsoft disagreed sharply on whether the company should be released from the rules put in place by a 2002 consent decree, legal filings revealed Thursday. Key parts of the consent decree -- which grew out of the 2002 antitrust settlement struck with Microsoft by the U.S. Department of Justice and 20 states -- are scheduled to expire Nov. 12. Those rules, which have been overseen by U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, spell out prohibitions against Microsoft -- including ones that bar it from retaliating against manufacturers -- as well as requirements, such as one that demands the company disclose APIs to competitors so they can make their software run more smoothly with Windows. Reports filed to Kollar-Kotelly Thursday show that regulators are split in their opinions of the decree's effectiveness and whether it should be extended past Nov. 12. On one side, the U.S. Department of Justice and five states -- New York, Louisiana, Maryland, Ohio, and Wisconsin -- told Kollar-Kotelly that the decree had done its job. "The United States and the New York group respectively submit that the final judgments have achieved [their] goals," the group's report read. Thomas Barnett, the assistant attorney general who heads the Justice Department's antitrust division, was more specific. "The final judgments have been successful in preventing Microsoft from continuing the type of exclusionary behavior that led to the original lawsuit," he said in a statement. Six states and the District of Columbia, all part of the group that rejected the settlement when it was first proposed by the Department of Justice in 2001, sharply dissented. Lead by California, the group -- which also includes D.C., Connecticut, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, and Massachusetts -- said Microsoft's grip on the industry was as strong as ever. "There can be little doubt that Microsoft's market power remains undiminished and that key provisions of the final judgment have had little or no competitively significant impact. "Microsoft's commingling violation has not been effectively addressed, Microsoft remains in possession of the fruits of its violation, and the competitive conditions antedating Microsoft's anticompetitive conduct have not been restored," the California group said in its filing. "The final judgment clearly has had little or no discernible impact in the marketplace as measured by the most commonly used metric, market shares," the group said. Its report then went on to cite sources, including research firm IDC, to show that in some cases -- server operating system share, for example -- Microsoft's slice has grown dramatically. Not surprisingly, Microsoft reached a different conclusion in its report filed Thursday. "The final judgments created an environment in which market forces can determine the relative success and thus the market shares of participants," the company said. "Measured by that standard, the final judgments have been a success." Earlier this year, Kollar-Kotelly told the plaintiffs that she didn't want last-minute objections to the Nov. 12 expiration, prompting them to file now. A status hearing before Kollar-Kotelly on Sept. 11 -- the next-to-last such hearing scheduled before the decree is set to lapse -- also played a part in the timing. Hints that the California contingent would argue that Microsoft's probation should be extended came this morning in the Los Angeles Times, which quoted California Attorney General Jerry Brown as saying that the 2002 settlement "has not been all that effective." Microsoft's general counsel, Brad Smith, disagreed. "As it was specifically intended, the consent decree defined clear rules for how Microsoft competes without preordaining winners in the technology marketplace," Smith said in a statement. "The consent decree shaped how we view our responsibilities and led us to adopt a set of voluntary principles that will continue to apply, even after major parts of the U.S. antitrust ruling expire this November." In July 2006, Microsoft published a three-principle, 12-tenet manifesto dubbed "Windows Principles: Twelve Tenets to Promote Competition" that it promised to abide by. The first principle on the list: "Choice for Computer Manufacturers and Customers." California and its fellow states shot back. "These 'Windows Principles' are, of course, completely voluntary, and it is unclear whether they are simply a public relations gesture or something more substantive," the group's report stated. Kollar-Kotelly will hear arguments from the parties at the Sept. 11 meeting; at some point after that, but presumably before Nov. 12, she is expected to render her decision. Computerworld is an InfoWorld affiliate
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A federal judge ruled on Tuesday to extend the U.S. government's antitrust oversight of Microsoft Corp  for two more years, but stopped short of granting a five-year extension sought by states accusing the company of continuing monopolistic behavior.
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The European commission, which fined Microsoft a record â¬497m (Â£345) this year for abusing its dominant position, yesterday vowed to continue pursuing the US software group through the courts for anti-competitive behaviour.
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(InfoWorld) - Microsoft has agreed to settle a multimillion dollar lawsuit brought by thousands of Iowa consumers and businesses who say the company's anticompetitive practices forced them to pay inflated prices for software including Microsoft's Windows, Word and Excel. Seven years after it was filed, the class-action suit finally began on Dec. 1 in a Des Moines, Iowa, courtroom. Microsoft agreed to settle before the jury reached a verdict. Neither the company nor the plaintiffs' law firm announced the amount that Microsoft agreed to pay, but the suit had originally asked for $329 million in damages. In a statement, Microsoft said the terms of the settlement would not be disclosed until judges approve the agreement during hearings in April and August. The case covers Iowa residents who bought certain OS and application software between May 18, 1994, and June 30, 2006. Microsoft also agreed to pay half of any unclaimed proceeds to the Iowa Department of Education, to be used for bridging the digital and technical divide in Iowa schools through the purchase of computer hardware and software, according to a statement by Rich Wallis, associate general counsel for Microsoft. Customers across the U.S. filed dozens of antitrust class-action suits against Microsoft, but this was only the second one to go to trial, according to a statement by the plaintiffs' law firm, Zelle, Hofmann, Voelbel, Mason and Gette. Microsoft also agree to settle a Minnesota case for $182 million before it reached a verdict. In 2001, Microsoft agreed to settle a lawsuit brought by the U.S. Department of Justice and the attorneys general for 19 states, the company said. Microsoft has also reached settlements with three more state governments. Whereas all those cases alleged that Microsoft harmed competition by including certain applications in its OS (thus essentially barring other software vendors from the market), the Iowa and Minnesota cases allege that Microsoft used its enormous market share to overcharge consumers. The only remaining private class-action lawsuit of that type is in Mississippi, according to Microsoft. Microsoft has denied overcharging those customers. "During our opening this week, we showed the real reasons for Microsoft's success. We demonstrated that the plaintiffs' core allegations in this case are decades old, long resolved and have no impact on the issues in this case," Wallis said when the Iowa case opened in December. "The majority of the plaintiffs' claims predate the class period in this case. The allegations that came afterward were addressed by the government case eight years ago. Microsoft accepted responsibility, changed its practices, and to this day we continue to live and work under a consent decree." The Microsoft operating systems covered in this case include MS-DOS, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition, Windows Millennium Edition, Windows for Workgroups, Windows NT Workstation, Windows 2000 and Windows XP. The applications include Word, Excel and Office versions designed for computers with the above MS-DOS or Windows operating systems. Â
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Microsoft agreed yesterday to pay more than $500 million to settle a potential antitrust lawsuit by rival software maker Novell but will likely have to fight another part of Novell&#39;s claim in court.
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Microsoft Corp. must pay $1.52 billion in damages to telecommunications equipment maker Alcatel-Lucent SA for violating two patents related to digital music, a federal jury ruled Thursday.
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A U.S. federal jury found that  Microsoft Corp.  infringed audio patents held by  Alcatel-Lucent   and should pay $1.52 billion in  damages, Microsoft said on Thursday.
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Microsoft&#39;s compliance with a&#160;U.S. antitrust settlement&#160;will remain under court supervision for another two years, in part because the company delayed producing documentation required by the court, a federal judge ruled Tuesday.
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The European Commission will fine  Microsoft  between 200 million (&#36;255 million) and 300  million euros on Wednesday to punish it for failing to carry  out antitrust sanctions, sources familiar with the situation  said on Tuesday.
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California consumers and  businesses will soon receive $1.1 billion in delayed payouts  from Microsoft Corp.  to settle antitrust claims  against the world's biggest software maker, lawyers in the case  said on Wednesday.
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A U.S. federal jury found that Microsoft Corp.  infringed audio patents held by Alcatel-Lucent   and should pay $1.52 billion in damages, the No. 1 software maker said on Thursday.
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SEATTLE/NEW YORK  - Microsoft Corp. MSFT.O said  on Monday said it will pay $536 million to its smaller rival  Novell Inc. NOVL.O to settle an antitrust suit and resolved a  10-year dispute with a computer trade group.