The European Commission (EC), the executive arm of the European Union (EU), yesterday sent an ultimatum to Microsoft, giving Microsoft eight more days to comply with an EU antitrust order or face daily fines of up to 3 million euros (around US$3.8 million).

Microsoft, which was fined 280.5 million euros, or US$358.7 million, in July for flouting an EU ruling, still has not provided complete information to competitors on how its Windows operating system communicates over a network, according to the EC.
"We'll take whatever measures necessary to obtain compliance," said Jonathan Todd, a spokesman for EU competition commissioner Neelie Kroes, the EU's top antitrust official.

The July decision to fine the company was the first by the EC for failure to comply with an antitrust ruling. Microsoft last month appealed the additional fine.

"As of today, the (European) commission has not received the complete documentation regarding all relevant protocols that is required to comply with its March 2004 decision," the EC said in a press release.

"The (European) commission expects the remaining omissions and deficiencies in the technical documentation to be remedied by Nov. 23 so that by the end of November the entire set of technical documentation will be available for potential licenses to review," it added.

EU regulators must then decide if Microsoft has not abused its monopoly by deliberately withholding technical data from rivals.

That decision would be based on comments from potential licenses and advice from an independent monitor, a computer scientist professor, Neil Barrett, on whether that information is "operational."

"Should Microsoft continue to fail to comply, the amount of the daily penalty payment to which Microsoft could be subject would be increased from up to 2 million euros to up to 3 million euros per day with effect from July 31, 2006," the EC warned.

It was reported that Microsoft said Wednesday that it was " committed to full compliance" and that it had assigned 300 people to meet the EU's demands.

Microsoft is preparing to ship a new version of Windows to business customers at the end of the month after making changes demanded by the EU and South Korea.