Microsoft is hoping to unbundle its chat and video app Teams from its Office product which will make it a tad bit easier for other competitive products to work with its software, the US based company informed on Thursday . It is regarded as a move aimed at staving off a EU antitrust fine.
The aforementioned changes came a month after the European Commission had started an investigation into Microsoft’s tying of Office and Teams leading to a complaint by Salesforce-owned workspace messaging app Slack in 2020. It is said that Microsoft’s preliminary concessions failed to address concerns. The EU competition enforcer on 31st August said that it took note of the company’s announcement and quashed the rumours. Teams was added to Office 365 way earlier in 2017 for free. It gradually replaced Skype for business and gained wide stream recognition during the pandemic due to the video conferencing feature.
“Today we are announcing proactive changes that we hope will start to address these concerns in a meaningful way, even while the European Commission’s investigation continues and we cooperate with it,” Nanna-Louise Linde, Microsoft’s current vice president for European government affairs.
The following changes would be effective from October 1st while being applicable in Europe and Switzerland. Office without Teams will be sold at a lower price, EUR 2 (nearly Rs. 180) less per month or EUR 24 (nearly Rs. 2,160) per year to Microsoft’s core enterprise customers, which showcase most of the company’s commercial business in Europe.