News

Court Favors Microsoft over Novell in WordPerfect Antitrust Case

• By Kurt Mackie
• September 24, 2013

Novell has lost its appeal in a case that alleged Microsoft abused its Windows monopoly to gain market share for Microsoft Office.

A three-judge panel at the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday affirmed an earlier court ruling that Microsoft didn't break antitrust laws about 18 years ago when it held back certain changes in a beta release of its Windows 95 operating system, according to an account by the Deseret News.

Novell had originally sought about $1 billion in damages from Microsoft.

Microsoft intentionally held up certain changes in Windows 95 at the beta release stage with the aim of favoring its Office suite over IBM's Lotus Notes and Novell's WordPerfect word processing programs, according to a 1994 memo authored by then-CEO Bill Gates. That conduct was not considered to be antitrust activity under the Sherman Act, according to the opinion originally issued by Judge J. Frederick Motz in a Utah Central Division court. He argued then that "a monopolist generally has no duty to cooperate with its competitors" and the federal appeals court upheld that view.

WordPerfect on DOS once predominated in the word processing market. It's estimated to have held half of that market in 1990, and 36 percent of that market at the end of 1994, which is when Novell owned the product. Novell subsequently sold WordPerfect to Corel in 1996, and Novell itself was acquired by Attachmate in late 2010. The Windows 95 transition away from DOS marked the downfall of WordPerfect in the market and the rise of the mouse-driven Microsoft Word. Microsoft Word is currently the market leader.

Novell has just a few options at this point. It could request an appeal of the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals' ruling, pursue the case at the Supreme Court or drop the lawsuit, according the Deseret News.