Microsoft set to face scrutiny over ISP bid

Alleged attempts to impose exclusionary contractual obligations on ISP and PC manufacturer business partners is the focus of the US Department of Justice trial against Microsoft this week.

The DoJ will attempt to prove that Microsoft illegally pressurised ISPs into contracts which were designed to harm the business of rival browser vendor Netscape.

The trial has already featured four days of laborious testimony from Netscape chief executive Jim Barksdale. America Online's senior vice president David Colburn is scheduled to take the stand on Wednesday, while Avie Tevanian, senior vice president of Apple, is due to testify before the end of the week.

Further videotaped testimony from Microsoft chief executive Bill Gates is also planned. In last week's deposition, Gates denied he was involved in setting up a meeting with Netscape in June 1995 where plans for carving up the browser market were allegedly discussed.

In what appears to be the most damaging evidence against Microsoft so far, the DoJ's chief counsel David Boies produced an email pre-dating the meeting in which Gates wrote: 'I think there is a very powerful deal of some kind we can do with Netscape. We could give it money as part of the deal - buy a piece of it or something.'

Meanwhile, an Italian law firm has lodged an anti-trust complaint against Microsoft on behalf of the International Alliance for Compatible Technology (IACT).

Monica Widegren, head of the international secretariat at the Swedish Competition Authority in Stockholm, said: 'We have had some indications that we should look into Microsoft's activities in the Swedish market.'

Iceland is locked in a battle with Microsoft because its refusal to translate software into Icelandic.