Google Flags Microsoft's Cloud Practices As Anti-Competitive

Alphabet Inc's GOOG GOOGL Google Cloud slammed Microsoft Corp MSFT for anti-competitive cloud computing practices.
Google Cloud also criticized Microsoft's imminent deals with European cloud vendors, saying these do not solve broader concerns about its licensing terms.
Google Cloud Vice President Amit Zavery told Reuters the company had raised the issue with antitrust agencies and urged European Union antitrust regulators to take a closer look.
Microsoft reiterated its May blog post where its president Brad Smith mentioned its number two position in cloud services, with just over 20% market share of global cloud services revenues.
There is intense rivalry between the two U.S. tech giants in the multi-billion-dollar cloud computing business, where Google trails market leader Amazon.com Inc AMZN and Microsoft.
Reportedly, Microsoft has offered to change its cloud computing practices in a deal with smaller rivals and stave off an EU investigation.
Microsoft is leveraging a lot of its dominance in the on-premise business as well as Office 365 and Windows to tie Azure and the rest of cloud services and make it hard for customers to have a choice, Zavery said in an interview late on Wednesday.
Microsoft's bundling practices, pricing, and licensing restrictions are making it difficult for customers to choose other providers, Zavery said.
Zavery said individual deals struck with several smaller European cloud vendors only benefit Microsoft.
Zavery emphasized that it was a broader issue with the cloud beyond Google and therefore sought a holistic solution from the regulators.
Zavery urged an open, flexible way to deploy software and give customers more choices.
Price Action: MSFT shares traded higher by 0.21% at $281.11 premarket on the last check Thursday.
Photo by Rainer Stropek via Flickr

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