Microsoft bails out of European competition hearing

Cancels due to shortage of watchdogs

Microsoft has turned down the chance to give oral evidence to the European Competition Commission – because the date clashes with a big beanfeast for regulators in Switzerland.

The software giant was to present evidence at an oral hearing between 3 and 5 June. This was a chance for both sides to air issues around Microsoft’s bundling of Internet Explorer with Windows, which the Commission believes breaches competition laws.

But the hearing clashes with a meeting in Zurich for 600 anti-trust and fair trade regulators from around the world. The event is expected to be particularly popular because it is the first such meeting to attended by President Obama’s newly-chosen officials. The US is widely expected to take a much tougher, more interventionist, regulatory line than it charted under the Bush administration.

Read more: theregister.co.uk