The CMA opens its fourth Strategic Market Status case into Microsoft

"The UK's Competition and Markets Authority has opened a Strategic Market Status investigation into Microsoft's business software ecosystem, the fourth such case under the digital markets regime that came into force in January 2025."

"The case covers Windows, Office (Word, Excel, and the rest), Teams, the rapidly expanding Copilot footprint, server operating systems, database management systems, and security software."

"The regulator's central question is whether Microsoft uses that position to limit customer choice, and the mechanisms it has named are the familiar three: bundling, interoperability gaps, and default settings."

"The CMA's cloud services market investigation closed in July 2025 with a final decision that found Microsoft was charging AWS and Google Cloud materially higher wholesale prices for its own software than it charged Azure customers for the same products."

The UK Competition and Markets Authority opened a Strategic Market Status investigation into Microsoft’s business software ecosystem under the digital markets regime. The scope includes Windows, Office applications, Teams, Copilot, server operating systems, database management systems, and security software. The CMA’s central question is whether Microsoft uses its position to limit customer choice through bundling, interoperability gaps, and default settings. Microsoft has more than 15 million commercial users in the UK across the ecosystem, sold to hundreds of thousands of businesses and public-sector buyers. The CMA previously found in a cloud services market investigation that Microsoft charged AWS and Google Cloud materially higher wholesale prices for its software than it charged Azure customers for the same products, and it recommended SMS investigations for both Microsoft and AWS.

Read at TNW | Microsoft