Britains competition watchdog has changed its time-table for the cloud computing market probe pushing the initial findings to Jan-2025 (but keeping the Jul-2025 deadline for the final report)
The Competition and Markets Authority is looking into how Amazon‚ Microsoft and Google run their cloud services; focusing on data-transfer costs multi-supplier limitations and volume-based pricing that might stop customers from switching providers
The probe specifically targets Microsofts software rules – including how it handles Windows Server and Microsoft-365 on other cloud platforms. A UK-based competition expert has now filed a high-stakes legal claim suggesting British companies might be owed more than 1-billion pounds in damages due to these practices
In a related move the US Federal Trade Commission started its own check of Microsofts market position: examining how the tech-giant handles cloud-service data transfers and if its making it too hard for customers to move away from Azure (their main cloud platform)
The investigation comes after the UK media regulator pointed out several market issues including:
- High costs for moving data between providers
- Pricing systems that lock-in customers
- Technical blocks for using multiple cloud services
- Complex licensing terms that limit choices