Microsoft makes Fast exit to BSA

Microsoft has decided to discontinue its relationship with the Federation Against Software Theft (Fast) in favour of global piracy investigator Business Software Alliance (BSA). A representative for Microsoft UK said: ?We just got to the review time of the year and in the light of more international software piracy, we decided to continue with the BSA because they are a glo bal organisation.? The news will come as a blow to Fast, which this time last year lost Novell to the BSA. Martin Smith, in charge of investigation at Novell UK, said Novell had switched to the BSA for much the same reason as Microsoft ? increased software piracy across national boundaries. The industry has expected Microsoft to withdraw from Fast for some months because of operational conflicts. Fast was set up 10 years ago by the then Microsoft MD David Fraser. Both the MS UK representative and Smith refused to comment on Fast?s future viability. Microsoft will continue to co-operate with Fast and the company denied that it withdrew from the organisation because it had not got its own way about the way things were done.