Microsoft "Windows 7 E" plan for Europe change lane

"I’m pleased to report that we will ship the same version of Windows 7 in Europe in October that we will ship in the rest of the world," Dave Heiner, vice president and deputy general counsel at Microsoft, wrote in a blog post.

The decisions came after the European Commission showed a positive response to Microsoft’s recent "consumer ballot screen” proposal which will give chance to consumers in Europe to choose the Web browser of their choice to surf the Internet.

The "consumer ballot screen” will serve a as a gateway where a user can chose one or more browser such as Firefox, Safari and Opera.

"We believe this approach addresses the Commission’s previously stated competition law concerns regarding our inclusion of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE) browser in Windows," Heiner wrote.

In January the European Commission provided its preliminary view that Microsoft’s “bundling” of Internet Explorer in Windows violated European competition law.

To meet that goal, and in light of the Commission’s pending legal inquiry of Microsoft inclusion of IE in Windows, the firm announces in June the plans of shipping Windows 7 "E" in Europe where the "E" version means that the new operating system will include all the features and functionality of Windows 7 other than browsing with Internet Explorer.