[spectre] Row over EU official considering Microsoft job

[Geert Lovink]

>  Row over EU official considering Microsoft job
>
> 07.09.2006 - 10:00 CET | By Helena Spongenberg
> An EU official set to head the European Commission's antitrust case
> against Microsoft is instead considering a job with a consultancy that
> counts Microsoft as one of its major clients.
>
> Frenchman Henri Piffaut was this week chosen to take over in October
> as head of the unit handling the Microsoft antitrust case and other
> high profile technology cases, sources told Reuters.
>
> <http://euobserver.com/adserver/adclick.php?bannerid=105&zoneid=18&sou
> rce=&dest=http%3A%2F%2Fenglish.www.gov.tw%2FUN%2F>
>
> But Mr Piffaut has also asked for leave from the commission after
> being offered a senior role at LECG – a global economic consultancy
> that advises Microsoft on antitrust issues and which goes with the
> motto "the expert inside".
>
> "A request for leave on personal grounds has been made [by Mr Piffaut]
> but no decision has yet been made on that request," commission
> spokesman Jonathan Todd said.
>
> He also added that officials who left the commission or took personal
> leave must agree to strict measures so that there is no conflict of
> interest in their work.
>
> Managing director of LECG's Brussels office, Atilano Jorge Padilla,
> confirmed to the Times that he was trying to hire Mr Piffaut, but that
>  it was for his expertise in merger economics rather than anti-trust
> work.
>
> Mr Piffaut would lead the economists in the Brussels office, and help
> hire additional staff, Mr Padilla said.
>
> The EU executive office has been locked in a dispute with Microsoft
> for years over its widely used operating system Windows, with the
> commission accusing the firm of obstructing rival software firms like
> Adobe and IBM from running software through Windows.
>
> Brussels fined in March 2004 the software giant nearly EUR500 million
> and another EUR281 million in July this year for ignoring the first
> order.
>
> *If you can't beat them, join them*
> The case is similar to a 2002 case when EU official Detlef Eckert, who
> worked as a head of unit and had interviewed a number of Microsoft
> rivals who complained about the software giant's behaviour, was
> allowed  to work for Microsoft itself.
>
> Last spring, environmental group Greenpeace addressed four cases of
> "revolving doors" between the commission and the chemicals industry
> together with its lobby groups.
>
> In its report on the working of the EU chemicals law REACH, Greenpeace
> pointed out that people working in the commission cross the border to
> the industry or its lobby groups and vice versa.
>
> -- 
> Aleksandra Kordecka
> Chemicals Campaigner
> Friends of the Earth Europe
> Rue Blanche 15, B-1050 Brussels
> t: +32 2 542 61 08 ; m: +32 498 505 165