CISPE gives Microsoft an ultimatum after a long-standing complaint about licensing. Microsoft must stop unfair competition or take legal action.

The case has been dragging on since 2022, but now the European cloud providers finally seem to want to make a decision. Microsoft must stop pushing other cloud providers into the background with its licensing conditions, otherwise legal action will have to be taken.

CISPE vs Microsoft

Cloud Infrastructure Providers in Europe (CISPE), a non-profit industry group based in Brussels, previously sat down with Microsoft to discuss how the company can leave out other cloud providers through its licensing terms. Microsoft offers discounts on its own software when bundled with its own Azure cloud services. This makes it more expensive to run software on competing clouds, which means unfair competition. Based on the Azure Pricing Calculator, CISPE was able to show the unfair price difference and the core problem.

In addition, CISPE is also dissatisfied with the prices for license agreements for service providers. For running SQL Server Enterprise licenses on non-Azure servers, Microsoft’s percentages are in the double digits. This again undermines fair competition. This price and feature discrimination by Microsoft binds customers and squeezes the margins of other cloud infrastructure providers.

Whether the CISPE’s ultimatum will end the protracted case remains to be seen. Although Microsoft is faced with a choice, the complaint won’t simply go away. The EU already has this matter in its sights.