Brussels (Brussels Morning Newspaper) – Microsoft honors European regulations, including significant laws aimed at limiting Big Tech’s influence, according to President Brad Smith. This stance contrasts with the White House’s criticism of sanctions related to European Union rules.
Last week, the European Commission angered the White House by imposing total fines of 700 million euros on Apple and Meta Platforms for violating the bloc’s Digital Markets Act, which lays out specific regulations for Big Tech.
How is Microsoft responding to EU tech regulations?
“We understand that European laws apply to our business practices in Europe, just as local laws apply to local practices in the United States and similar laws apply elsewhere in the world. This includes European competition law and the Digital Markets Act, among others,”
Smith stated in a blog post, also delivered at an address in Brussels.
“We’re committed not only to building digital infrastructure for Europe but to respecting the role that laws across Europe play in regulating our products and services,”
He said.
Microsoft, which faced 2.2 billion euros in EU antitrust fines two decades ago, is now trying to avoid a potential penalty by proposing changes to its Office-Teams pricing. The investigation by the European Union is still in progress.
How is Microsoft addressing EU competition concerns?
Smith detailed strategies to address EU worries regarding the dominance of U.S. tech giants in cloud computing, which have led some EU governments to urge restrictions on these companies’ participation in lucrative government contracts. These concerns have intensified due to anxieties surrounding European data privacy.
“In the unlikely event we are ever ordered by any government anywhere in the world to suspend or cease cloud operations in Europe, we are committing that Microsoft will promptly and vigorously contest such a measure using all legal avenues available, including by pursuing litigation in court,”
Smith said.
“To further cement the nexus between Microsoft and Europe, going forward our European datacenter operations and their boards will be overseen by a European board of directors that consists exclusively of European nationals and operates under European law,”
He said.
He mentioned that Microsoft plans to boost its European data centre capacity by 40% within the next two years and will enhance its data centre operations across 16 European countries. “When combined with our recent construction, the plans we’re announcing today will more than double our European datacenter capacity between 2023 and 2027,” Smith said.
