14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft can go on with its plans to take over Nokia’s smartphone business, as the European Commission has finally decided to give the go-ahead for the deal.
The transaction is expected to complete in early 2014, when Microsoft will officially take over the devices and services business, as well as patents owned by Nokia for approximately $7.4 billion (€5.4 billion).
The European Commission sysd in a press statement that it sees no antitrust issues with the deal, as “Microsoft is unlikely to restrict the supply of its Windows OSs for smart mobile devices to third party device manufacturers after the transaction.”
At the same time, Redmond is “unlikely to restrict the supply of its mobile apps, such as its Office suite apps and its communication app Skype, to competing providers of smart mobile devices,” the Commission says, which pretty much makes sense, as the company has already announced plans to bring its apps on other platforms.
“Since Office apps are currently not available on tablets running third party OSs, a potential supply restriction would be limited to other tablet suppliers using Microsoft's Windows OSs. However, this strategy would hamper Microsoft's interest to attract more app developers and ultimately users to its OSs for smart mobile devices. For smartphones, the share of Office apps is minimal and there are many popular competing apps,” the EU explains.
Both Samsung and Apple, the European Commission mentions, will still be able to compete with the merged entity formed by Microsoft and Nokia. Samsung and Apple are at this point the top companies in the mobile sector, and the deal between Microsoft and Nokia shouldn’t change that.
Microsoft is yet to release a statement on this, but given the fact that EU’s OK on the deal was the last major milestone in the Nokia takeover deal, expect the company’s board to be very pleased with the news.