Russian antitrust delays Microsoft case hearing for lack of proof

MOSCOW, Dec 20 (PRIME) -- Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service has delayed consideration of a case against Microsoft, suspected of abusing its dominant position, preliminarily until the end of January 2017, a service spokesperson said Tuesday.

“Hearings of the Microsoft case were postponed on request of the company and in view of the need to obtain additional proof,” the spokesperson said.

The watchdog opened the case against Microsoft on November 10 after local antivirus firm Kaspersky Lab’s complaint that the U.S. company had cut the compatibility adaptation time of antivirus software of third-party developers for operating system Windows 10 to six calendar days from two months.

The service’s Deputy Director Anatoly Golomolzin said then that Microsoft develops antivirus software Windows Defender, which turns on automatically, if a third-party program fails to adapt to Windows 10. Such operations lead to groundless advantages of Microsoft on the software market, he said.

Microsoft insisted that it sticks to the competition law. A spokesperson for Kaspersky Lab said earlier the company would address the European Commission until the end of 2016 with a similar complaint against Microsoft.

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