I’m Steve Ember with the VOA Special English Economics Report.
The European Commission ruled Wednesday that Microsoft is still using its
powerful market position illegally. The top European Union official for
competition policy ordered a fine of more than two hundred eighty million euros.
The amount is almost three hundred sixty million dollars. Microsoft said it
would appeal in court.
In March of 2004, the commission ordered Microsoft to release
technical information about its Windows operating system. At that time, the
commission fined the company almost five hundred million euros.
The order was meant to permit competitors to create software that can operate
with Microsoft products. It is estimated that more than ninety percent of
personal computers in the world use Windows.
Brad Smith is Microsoft's top lawyer. He released a statement from the
company headquarters in Redmond, Washington, after the fine was announced.
Mr. Smith says Microsoft has already provided thousands of pages of technical
documents. He says the March two thousand four decision was not clear and that
clarity is the real issue.
Mr. Smith says Microsoft finally received a clear definition of the
requirements this April and has already met nearly all of them. He says the
company has "over three hundred employees working around the clock" to finish by
July twenty-fourth. And he says it is hard to understand the huge fine when, in
his words, "the agreed-upon finish line is just days away."
Neelie Kroes is the European Union commissioner for competition policy. She
says the two thousand four decision was completely clear. She noted that a
European court had ordered Microsoft more than eighteen months ago to release
the information without delay.
Mizz Kroes said Microsoft did not even come close to providing complete
information as demanded. This is the first time the European Union has fined a
company for failing to meet an anti-trust decision. If Microsoft does not
satisfy the commission by July thirty-first, it faces possible fines of three
million euros per day. That is almost four million dollars.
Bill Gates and his friend Paul Allen started Microsoft in nineteen
seventy-five. Microsoft earned just under three thousand million dollars in
profit in the period from January through March of this year.
This VOA Special English Economics Report was written by Mario Ritter. You
can download transcripts and audio of our reports at voaspecialenglish.com. I'm
Steve Ember.
（來源：VOA 英語點津姍姍編輯）
