IBM Gets Eyed by the European Commission

The European Commission is handling a fair number of antitrust litigations and it seems as though it just got two more to deal with. Apparently, IBM has now become the subject of scrutiny and it seems it now has to deal with its own share of antitrust charges. The EC claims that some of its rules were broken when it comes to the company's conduct in the market for mainframe computers. As such, the Commission has kicked off not one, but two distinct investigations.

It is claimed that Big blue was trying to stop the developments in the field of emulation technology. This technology allows users to run critical applications on hardware not developed by IBM.

The charges state that the outfit supposedly participated in "anti-competitive practices with a view to foreclosing the market for maintenance services, in particular by restricting or delaying access to spare parts for which IBM is the only source."

T3 and Turbo Hercules, both emulator software vendors, sparked one of the investigations by accusing IBM of willfully selling its mainframe hardware along with its own operating system. The other case stems from the Commission's own suspicions that IBM engaged in discriminatory tactics against rival mainframe suppliers. All in all, IBM is facing a heavy fine should the findings turn out to be in its disfavor.

“This filing is so indicative of the competition enforcement vacuum we have had, in that on the very last day of the Bush administration yet another company had to go file an antitrust case overseas because US antitrust authorities have been unreliable for the past eight years,” stated Ed Black, president of the Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA).

"We did not file a formal complaint but did meet with the Commission in the middle of last year - we came away from that meeting with a strong sense of what we needed to prove,” said Steven Friedman, president of t3. “We have now given them 500 pages of very comprehensive and compelling evidence which we are confident will lead to a formal investigation."