Microsoft-Case-Study
Application Software.
Around 1990, Microsoft became more aggressive in application software for IBM-standard PCs. It began to bundle Word, Excel, and PowerPoint into a popular suite, MS Office. It also began to offer “competitive upgrades” – discounts for customers who were switching from WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3.Starting in 1995 and all the way to 2008, MS was the dominant provider of word processors, spreadsheets, and presentation software.
Internet Browsers.
Bill Gates sent a memo to his top team in 1995, making it clear that their focus on the Internet is crucial to every part of their business. A section in the memo titled “Competition” highlighted Netscape as “a new competitor ‘born on’ the internet”. Promising to “embrace and extend” the internet, MS released Internet Explorer (IE), their own version of a web browser. It was offered for free and bundled with Windows. Soon after, versions of IE were available not only for Windows, but also for Apple and Unix OSs. MS also made deals with Internet Service providers (ISPs) who agreed to install IE when they provided internet to their customers. They also went to the extent of allowing AOL to place their icon on the Windows’ desktop, even though they were competitors. Netscape tried keeping up but their costs went up and webmasters started optimizing their sites for IE and not Navigator. All of this prompted the U.S. Department of Justice to bring an antitrust case against MS in 1998. They said that MS abused the power of its OS monopoly in order to create a new monopoly in the browser market.In 2001 MS reached a settlement with the government where they were required to disclose ceratin aspect of its software code to other firms and prohibited discriminatory agreements with PC makers. It also barred MS from bundling other applications with Windows unless rival amkers had equal access to being bundled with Windows.
Java.
As the internet went up, so did a programming language called Java, from Sun
Around 1990, Microsoft became more aggressive in application software for IBM-standard PCs. It began to bundle Word, Excel, and PowerPoint into a popular suite, MS Office. It also began to offer “competitive upgrades” – discounts for customers who were switching from WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3.Starting in 1995 and all the way to 2008, MS was the dominant provider of word processors, spreadsheets, and presentation software.
Internet Browsers.
Bill Gates sent a memo to his top team in 1995, making it clear that their focus on the Internet is crucial to every part of their business. A section in the memo titled “Competition” highlighted Netscape as “a new competitor ‘born on’ the internet”. Promising to “embrace and extend” the internet, MS released Internet Explorer (IE), their own version of a web browser. It was offered for free and bundled with Windows. Soon after, versions of IE were available not only for Windows, but also for Apple and Unix OSs. MS also made deals with Internet Service providers (ISPs) who agreed to install IE when they provided internet to their customers. They also went to the extent of allowing AOL to place their icon on the Windows’ desktop, even though they were competitors. Netscape tried keeping up but their costs went up and webmasters started optimizing their sites for IE and not Navigator. All of this prompted the U.S. Department of Justice to bring an antitrust case against MS in 1998. They said that MS abused the power of its OS monopoly in order to create a new monopoly in the browser market.In 2001 MS reached a settlement with the government where they were required to disclose ceratin aspect of its software code to other firms and prohibited discriminatory agreements with PC makers. It also barred MS from bundling other applications with Windows unless rival amkers had equal access to being bundled with Windows.
Java.
As the internet went up, so did a programming language called Java, from Sun