Soon, many Microsoft Office customers worldwide can access cheaper subscriptions. It is not a promotion or isolated commercial gesture, but the result of years of Brussels. Microsoft has accepted change your strategy to close an antitrust investigation I could cost him expensive. With this agreement, the company dodges a possible fine and the European Commission reinforces its image as guardian of the rules that govern the digital market.
The European Commission confirmed that Microsoft must maintain versions of Office 365 and Microsoft 365 without Teamsyour communication tool, at a clearly lower price compared to the editions that include it. These conditions will be in force for at least seven years and will be complemented with interoperability and data portability commitments for a decade. The American company has indicated that it will implement changes globally.
Microsoft undertakes to lower prices and open its ecosystem
The origin of this pulse dates back to July 2020, When Slack denounced Microsoft to the European Commission For packaging Teams within Office, claiming that it made it difficult for users to choose alternatives. Three years later, Brussels opened a formal investigation To evaluate whether this practice was abuse of dominant position in the collaborative software market. The case focused on the impact of Teams integration on competitors such as Slack and other business communication platforms.
To reduce the pressure, Microsoft began taking action before a resolution arrived. In October 2023 he disaggregated Teams of his suites for commercial clients in the European and Switzerland Economic Space, with lower prices for those who chose not to include the tool. In April 2024 he extended this policy to the rest of the world, withdrawing for new business clients the traditional editions with Teams and introducing “without teams” plans along with an independent license. These steps sought to show good regulatory will and simplify the catalog for multinational companies, but did not suffice to close the file.
With the agreement announced this month, the measures become mandatory and more ambitious. Microsoft must guarantee a significant price difference and allow customers to migrate to versions without teams without penalties. It should be noted that to benefit from these sales, organizations must hire the new plans or make the change to renew subscriptions; There will be no automatic discounts for those who maintain current contracts.
It also undertakes to facilitate that rival services integrate Office applications into their platforms and that users export Teams data to other tools, reducing change barriers. This valued the measure, Teresa Ribera, executive vice president of the European Commission for the clean, fair and competitive transition:
“With today’s decision, we make binding for seven years or more Microsoft’s commitments to end their linking practices that could be preventing their competitors effectively competing with Teams. Therefore, today’s decision opens the competition in this crucial market and guarantees that companies can freely choose the communication and collaboration product that best suits their needs.”
Microsoft published concrete examples of prices that will enter vigor in November this year: In Enterprise plans, the difference will be up to 8 euros per user per month; In the Business Standard and Premium plans, it will be around 3 euros. Of course, domestic users and students will not see changes: their subscriptions of Microsoft 365 Personal or family did not include payment teams and are not affected by the new framework.
In any case, this episode arrives at a time where the commission has intensified its scrutiny about large technological in recent years, with multimillionaire sanctions to companies such as Google, which recently imposed a fine of 2,950 million euros. However, Brussels face a diplomatic challenge: the US president Donald Trump has criticized these measuresthreatening to activate section 301 of the Commerce Law as a response.
Images | Ed Hardie | Microsoft
In Xataka | The EU has put Apple against the strings: none of its options guarantees that its devices remain the same
GIPHY App Key not set. Please check settings