On April 23, Salesforce and Slack filed a lawsuit against Microsoft in London’s High Court, accusing the company of anticompetitive practices related to its Microsoft Teams app.
Speaking to Reuters, a Salesforce spokesperson indicated that "Microsoft's practices harmed competition, using tying and bundling of Teams to limit customer choice."
Per Salesforce's lawsuit, Microsoft bundling Teams with its Office suite is described as a calculated move designed to limit customer choice and restrict fair competition in the workplace collaboration market.
A Microsoft spokesperson dismissed Salesforce's claims, further indicating that the antitrust case against it lacked merit:
"Salesforce’s complaint lacks merit, and we’ll make our case before the Court in due course. Slack's lackluster growth, compared to Zoom and Teams, was based on inferior capabilities when COVID-19 hit in 2020, and had nothing to do with Microsoft." (via Salesforce Ben)
This isn’t the first time Salesforce has raised concerns about Microsoft’s business practices. Back in 2020, Slack filed a complaint with the European Commission, accusing Microsoft of abusing its market dominance by bundling Teams with its Office suite to stifle competition.
The complain further alleged that millions were forced to install Microsoft Teams without the ability to remove it. However, Microsoft dismissed the allegations, arguing that Slack’s struggles originated from its lack of integrated video‑conferencing features rather than any anticompetitive behavior.
But Microsoft caved to antitrust regulatory pressure, making some changes...
In 2025, Microsoft unbundled Teams from Office 365 in an attempt to dodge EU antitrust fines. For context, the European Commission launched a formal investigation into Microsoft for bundling Teams with Office 365 in 2023.
Microsoft made several commitments to the European Commission, including drastic changes in pricing for its core services. For context, it committed to offering Office 365 and Microsoft 365 without Teams at a lower cost, at around $2.20 (€2) less per user each month. As such, it started offering Teams as a standalone service for about $5.50 (€5) per user per month.
The tech giant also committed to improving how Teams works with competing platforms, making it easier for rival apps to integrate with Teams and other Microsoft services.
This is a developing story. I'll keep tabs on it as it unfolds and equally keep updated as new information becomes available.
Elsewhere, Microsoft is also facing a separate class‑action lawsuit, alleging that it set wholesale prices for Windows Server software higher on rival cloud platforms than on its own Azure service.
Do you think Microsoft is engaging in anticompetitive business practices by bundling Teams with its Office suite? Share your thoughts in the comments.
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