EU launches anti-trust investigation into IBM's mainframe practices

Dave Bailey, Computing, Monday 26 July 2010 at 18:13:00

Probe to investigate alleged mainframe dominance abuse by Big Blue

The European Commission (EC) has initiated formal anti-trust investigations
against the
IBM
Corporation in relation to its conduct in the mainframe market.

The EC has said it will look at two separate cases of alleged infringement of
EU anti-trust rules where it sees the abuse of a dominant market position.

The first case follows complaints by emulator software vendors
T3
Technologies and
TurboHercules,
alleging that IBM has tied mainframe hardware to its mainframe operating system.
It was this hardware that the software vendors were emulating; and IBM's alleged
actions have prevented them being able to sell software that runs on the
company's operating system.

The
second
case sees the EC investigating the company for alleged discriminatory behaviour
towards competing suppliers of mainframe maintenance services. It has launched
the case on its own intiative.

The EC says that in 2009 about ?8.5bn (�7.1bn) worldwide and ?3bn in the
European Economic Area was spent on new mainframe hardware and operating
systems.

Software developer and governmental affairs professional Florian Mueller
said: "I'm convinced that customers are being locked in and milked shamelessly
by IBM, and I hope that the outcome of the process will result in more customer
choice."

Ironically, IBM made one of its biggest
mainframe
announcements of the past 20 years last week, unveiling the next generation
of its mainframe hardware, zEnterprise.

According to IBM, ZEnterprise allows users to run x86 applications on server
blades which could be managed by IBM?s Unified Resource Manager, announced at
the same time.

The EC also said it had concerns that IBM may have engaged in
anti-competitive practices with a view to foreclosing the market for maintenance
services.

The commission has indicated that it may also make public the initiation of
proceedings in any appropriate way, although it would inform the parties
concerned before doing so.

Full story at http://www.computing.co.uk/computing/news/2267101/eu-launches-mainframe-antitrust