Word: antitrust
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Once upon a time, Microsoft bestrode the software world like a ruthless cartoon villain, gobbling up rivals and defying pleas for restraint from regulators. But the once impregnable giant has now been humbled: following an acrimonious 10-year antitrust battle with European regulators, Microsoft on Dec. 16 finally agreed to open its Windows operating system to rival Web browsers in Europe...
...Microsoft's move came as part of a legal settlement with the European Commission after a decade of skirmishes with the E.U.'s antitrust authority. Neelie Kroes, the E.U. competition commissioner, says Microsoft's previous approach denied consumers a fair choice. "It is as if you went to the supermarket and they only offered you one brand of shampoo on the shelf, and all the other choices are hidden out the back," Kroes said. "What we are saying today is that all the brands should be on the shelf." The settlement won't have a direct effect...
...settlement may also establish antitrust regulation as a key driver of innovation and competition in the IT sector. When Microsoft first began trading blows with the European Commission, it took a confrontational approach, as if it never believed it would be tamed by Brussels bureaucrats. But the tussles have cost Microsoft dearly: the E.U. watchdog has fined the company $2.4 billion for illegal business practices over the years. At the same time, the rise of companies like Apple and Google - which both enjoy quasi-monopolies in other technology sectors - creates a new challenge for Microsoft. Indeed, as Microsoft, Apple...
Almost from the start, however, legal troubles tangled NBC's corporate history. In 1931 antitrust issues forced RCA to split from General Electric; the orphaned company moved into new digs in New York City's Rockefeller Center (which remains its headquarters to this day). Despite a spirited rivalry with fellow broadcasting giant CBS in the golden age of radio, NBC ruled the dial - a supremacy that sparked further antitrust investigations from the newly created Federal Communications Commission. In 1939 the FCC ordered RCA to spin off NBC entirely; RCA, in a successful effort to avoid this outcome, instead sold...
...offerings had foundered: local affiliates were defecting to competitors CBS and ABC, which were proving deft at luring away younger audiences. The company was bought - again - by General Electric in 1986; the new owners quickly shed NBC's remaining radio operations in part to avoid (you guessed it) antitrust concerns...