Google Cloud has joined AWS and Europe-based Cloud Infrastructure Services Providers in Europe (CISPE) in protesting Microsoft’s anticompetitive cloud software licensing practices in the EU.
“Microsoft’s cloud licensing restrictions restrict choice and create harmful downstream impacts for companies, ranging from higher costs to more security breaches to a chilling effect on smaller cloud and software providers including European AI startups,” Amit Zavery, vice president of platforms at Google Cloud, wrote on X.
Microsoft should end the arbitrary “Listed Provider” designation and allow customers to run their previously purchased software on any platform without paying as much as 5x more to use non-Azure clouds, Zavery said, adding that Microsoft shouldn’t be permitted to pick and choose who it competes with.