US consumers and IT workers oppose MS breakup

Jane Wakefield ZDNet.co.uk

Published: 13 Jan 2000 17:26 GMT

Breaking up Microsoft is not what American executives and consumers want, if a report published Wednesday is to be believed.

While various news reports suggest US government lawyers favour splitting up the software giant, the trade association ACT (Association for Competitive Technology) has found consumers and IT professionals oppose such a proposal.

In a nationwide survey -- 907 consumers and 408 IT professionals took part in the survey. -- 93 percent said they believed Microsoft had not harmed consumers. 63 percent of IT executives oppose a breakup. "If consumers say they have not been harmed by Microsoft and IT industry says no to a breakup, why in the world would the government propose this extreme measure," questioned ACT president Jonathan Zuck.

Zuck believes that if Microsoft was split into an operating system company and a software firm, the pace of innovation would be slowed. "It would be a shame to install Judge Jackson as the one-man regulator of the IT industry," he said.