Microsoft Corp. received a slight relief on Wednesday, when a European Union court reduced the penalty imposed on the software giant for breaking antitrust laws.
The General Court, the second highest court in the European Union, rubbished Microsoft plea to terminate the fine completely, but reduced the fine by 39 million Euros to 860 million euros (roughly $1.1 billion).
Giving a reason for their decision to reduce the fine, the court said that the European Commission regulators, who had imposed the fine in 2008, had miscalculated the amount.
The regulators at the European Commission had fined Microsoft for using its dominant Windows operating system to squeeze competition.
Rob Enderle, principal analyst at The Enderle Group, said the fine would teach Microsoft some important lessons on how to do business on the world stage.
Speaking on the topic, Enderle said, “When it began, they seemed to believe they were above the government. They were very aggressive. And they really thought that the EU was made up of uninformed people.”
Former EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes had slapped Microsoft with the heavy fine for its failure to comply with her order to provide rival companies with information to work with its Windows operating system.