The Globalisation Institute, a European free market think-tank, wants the European Union to require that all PCs are to be sold without a pre-installed operating system.
The institute sent its policy advise to the European Commission last week. The vast majority of computers sold are commodity products. While manufacturers compete on styling and brand reputation, in addition to specification, no manufacturer or component manufacturer is the sole choice for consumers, the think tank writes. There is at least the choice between processor made by Intel and AMD. Memory chips and hard drives can also be supplied by several companies "Yet there is no meaningful competition between operating systems. Microsoft's dominant position is not in the public interest. It limits the market and has slowed technical development to the prejudice of consumers."
The report, authored by Alex Singleton, the institut's president, continues: "The Windows monopoly imposes an extra cost on virtually every EU business, as the price of operating systems would drop in a more competitive market. Moreover, there are other costs: some argue that support costs are higher for Windows than other operating systems, particularly when one considers security vulnerabilities that have plagued Windows systems. Encouraging competition would help EU businesses, lowering their costs."
The report was published less than a week after Microsoft lost its appeal at the European Court of first Instance against charges by the European Commission that the company abused its dominant position.
© European Communities 2007
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Further information:
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Unbundling Microsoft Windows policy brief (in English, pdf)