Antitrust and Law Update: Interesting Times for IP Holders in Europe, the Implications of Microsoft and IMS Health

On March 24th 2004, the European Commission issued its long awaited Microsoft decision, which has now been published on its Website.1 On April 29th 2004, the Court of Justice handed down its judgment in the IMS Health case.2 Both decisions have important implications for all companies with valuable IP portfolios that do business in the European Union. Although these decisions are arguably not revolutionary given the existing legal framework for dominant companies set out in Article 82 EC, they illustrate that EC competition law sometimes strikes a different balance than US antitrust law between spurring innovation by protecting IP rights and promoting competition in innovation-driven markets