by Fu Yun Chi
BRUSSELS, Aug 31 (Reuters) – Microsoft will separate its chat and video app Teams from its Office product and make it easier for rival products to work with its software, the US company said on Thursday in a move aimed at preventing a potential E.U. Took a step Disbelief is okay.
The proposed changes come a month after the European Commission launched an investigation into Microsoft’s integration of Office and Teams following a complaint by Salesforce-owned workspace messaging app Slack in 2020.
Microsoft’s initial concessions failed to allay concerns.
Teams was added to Office 365 for free in 2017. It eventually replaced Skype for Business and gained popularity due to its video conferencing during the pandemic.
“Today we are announcing proactive changes and we hope to address these concerns in a meaningful way as the European Commission’s investigation continues and we cooperate with it,” Nanna-Louise Linde, Microsoft’s vice president of European government affairs, said in a statement. Will start addressing from.” blog post.
He said the changes attempt to address two of the EU’s concerns: “Customers should be able to choose a business suite without Teams, at a lower cost than Teams should include, and we should be able to rival communications and collaboration.” More should be done to ease interoperability between solutions.” and Microsoft 365 and Office 365 suites”.
The changes, which will take effect from October 1, will apply in Europe and Switzerland.
Teams will be sold at a lower cost, as low as 2 euros per month or 24 euros ($26.17) per year, to Microsoft’s core enterprise customers, who represent the majority of the company’s commercial business in Europe.
New Enterprise customers can buy Teams standalone and separately for €5 per month or €60 per year, while existing Enterprise customers who already have a Suite with Teams can choose to keep it or go to the non-Teams suite Can go
Microsoft will also develop a new method for hosting Office web applications within competing apps and services, similar to what it does with Teams. ($1 = 0.9171 euro) (Reporting by Fu Yun Chi; Editing by Sharon Singleton)
Source: finance.yahoo.com
