Google EU complaint: Microsoft is punishing enterprises that use rivals to Azure [Video]

‘Even for customers who opt to pay the 400% markup, Microsoft refuses to provide critical upgrades and security updates,’ said the complaint.

Credit: FrentaN / Shutterstock

Google on Wednesday told the European Union (EU) that Microsoft is illegally using its dominant market position in Windows to force enterprises to use its Azure cloud service or face a 400% price penalty and a denial of upgrades and security patches. 

The complaint said that Microsoft is only punishing enterprises if they try to use products from three rival companies: Google, AWS, and Alibaba Cloud. It said the Microsoft efforts “are simply an artificial and arbitrary financial penalty for not using Azure. If these penalties were to monetize Microsoft’s IP [intellectual property], then they would apply to all non-Azure cloud providers and not just Azure’s top competitors.”

Microsoft, in an emailed statement, didn’t address the particulars of Google’s complaint, but did predict that the EU wouldn’t be …