Finally, the End is Near for the Microsoft Antitrust Case

Today, D.C. Circuit Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly will hear closing arguments in the remedy phase of the antitrust suit brought by nine states against Microsoft Corp.

Citizens for a Sound Economy Chairman C. Boyden Gray had these comments:

“It is hard to believe after 49 months of litigation, but absent an appeal, this entire affair may soon be over. Of course, the litigation will not end if Judge Kollar-Kotelly fails to reject the states’ punitive remedies. The extent to which the non-settling state attorneys general have served the interests of Microsoft’s competitors rather than the ideal of competition itself, is remarkable. Each of the proposed remedies is either explicit in its intention to debilitate Windows or benefit competitors’ products.

“It is also disturbing that the states seem disinterested in the case at hand. Of far more interest to them has been using what was supposed to be a ‘remedy’ phase to enter entirely new complaints into the record. To believe that Microsoft’s current actions deserve scrutiny because they are somehow analogous to past illegal behavior is to ignore the appeals’ court ruling. Microsoft was found to have responded illegally to the middleware threat posed by Java and Netscape. Yet nowhere in four weeks of testimony did the states furnish any evidence that any of the new applications addressed posed a similar threat.

“Ultimately, this is a case that must conclude with adoption of the revised proposed final judgment negotiated between Microsoft and the Department of Justice. Despite the protestations of the state attorneys general and the companies they are helping, there is no question that the agreement in place deserves great deference and adequately serves the public interest.”