The European Commission has accepted legally binding commitments from Microsoft to resolve competition concerns over the bundling of its collaboration tool Teams with the company’s Office 365 and Microsoft 365 productivity suites. The decision follows a two-year investigation triggered by complaints from Slack Technologies, now part of Salesforce, and German provider alfaview. The Commission had raised concerns that Microsoft abused its dominant position by tying Teams to its popular suites, limiting rivals’ ability to compete in the fast-growing market for workplace communication and collaboration tools.
Under the commitments, Microsoft will sell versions of its Office 365 and Microsoft 365 suites without Teams at a lower price, allow customers to switch away from Teams, and improve interoperability between competing products and Microsoft’s core applications such as Outlook, Word and Excel. Customers will also be able to move their Teams messaging data to rival platforms.
After a market test earlier this year, Microsoft strengthened its initial proposal by further widening the price gap between suites with and without Teams, requiring equal visibility of both options on its websites, and publishing detailed information on interoperability and data portability for developers. The company has also extended these measures globally and reduced prices for frontline worker packages without Teams.
The commitments will apply for seven years, while interoperability and data portability obligations will remain in force for ten years. A monitoring trustee will oversee compliance, mediate disputes, and report regularly to the Commission.
The Commission concluded that the package of measures sufficiently addressed its competition concerns and formally closed the investigation without finding an infringement of EU rules. If Microsoft fails to comply, it could face fines of up to 10 percent of its global turnover or daily penalty payments.
Executive Vice-President Teresa Ribera welcomed the outcome: “With today’s decision, we make binding for seven years or more Microsoft’s commitments to put an end to its tying practices that may be preventing rivals from effectively competing with Teams. Today’s decision therefore opens up competition in this crucial market, and ensures that businesses can freely choose the communication and collaboration product that best suits their needs.”
Microsoft introduced Teams in 2017 and began bundling it with Office 365 and Microsoft 365 two years later. The Commission launched its investigation in July 2023, concluding preliminarily that the practice restricted competition and gave Teams an unfair distribution advantage. Despite voluntary changes by Microsoft in 2023 and 2024, Brussels found them insufficient, prompting the negotiations that led to this settlement. Both Slack and alfaview withdrew their complaints following the Commission’s market test in mid-2025.
