By Suzanna Kerridge, 20 February 2002 12:20
NEWS Microsoft's anti-trust lawyers are preparing to go into battle again - this time with failed operating system maker Be. In a lawsuit, filed in a federal court in San Francisco yesterday evening, Be accused Microsoft of strangling its business by barring PC manufacturers from installing BeOS as well as Windows. In a statement Jean-Louis Gassée, CEO at Be and former Apple executive, said it is suing Bill Gates' company for "the destruction of its business as a direct result of the illegal and anti-competitive practices of Microsoft." In September 1998, Hitachi verbally committed to installing BeOS on its PCs along side Windows, stated the court filings. However, the company pulled out two months later claiming its licensing agreement with Microsoft prevented the installation of multiple operating systems. Be claims it found itself in a similar situation with Compaq. Jim Dresler, spokesman for Microsoft, claimed the litigation is not in the interests of the consumers, adding the company will respond accordingly. Gassée left Apple in 1990 to set up Be Inc and while it won critical acclaim within the IT industry it failed to achieve commercial success. Be's fame reached new heights in 1996 when it turned down a $125m offer from Apple to use the OS as the basis for the Mac OS. Gassée was reported to want $200m. Instead Apple bought Next, a company started by Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, for $400m. Its operating system became the basis for current iterations of Mac OS X. Be was eventually bought by Palm computing for $11m. Part of the BeOS is expected to be included in Palm's next operating system, Palm OS 5.
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