Usually when people are fined it’s for speeding, public intoxication, or even the occasional public nudity. These fines generally range from the $100-$500 range. For Microsoft their fine was $1.3 billion, the largest ever given to a person or business.

Microsoft was fined for charging too much for software developers that wanted to make their software Windows compliant. Windows might not have the stranglehold it once had, with Apple making a strong push along with Linux, but it’s still the most popular OS out there. So with this popularity Microsoft is able to profit from software developers using their operating system as a platform. The problem is the EU (European Union), had enough of Microsoft’s Ebenezer Scrooge tactics, and told them to lower their royalties fees. Microsoft complied but not quick enough as the EU slapped them with the fine.

Microsoft’s original royalty fee for patents was 3.87%, they drasitcally reduced the fee to 0.7%. Later Microsoft would eventually scratch the royalty fee in Europe and make flat fee of $14,000 to software developers, and lowered their worldwide rate to 0.4%.

This fine was the first time the EU charged a business with an anti-trust violation. Well atleast Microsoft can say they were the first, just isn’t an impressive feat as being the first home-used PC operating system.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 27th, 2008 at 9:58 am and is filed under Computers, Consumer Electronics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.