Products widely used in Ireland

APART from Microsoft's sizeable presence in Ireland, where it employs 1,500 people in software functions for the European market, its products are also widely used here.

Ireland would be considered a mature European market for Microsoft products. According to Mr Oliver Roll, director of business marketing for Microsoft UK and Ireland, its desktop applications - found on every personal computer - would be estimated to have a 90 per cent share of the Irish market.

Similarly, its applications suite, Microsoft Office, which runs on top of the Windows product, has around 90 per cent of the market.

Microsoft Ireland does not publish its revenues.

In the server applications market - the behind-the-scenes programmes which manage, store and distribute large amounts of data - Microsoft has between 30 per cent and 60 per cent of the business generated through its NT, Excel and Exchange products. BackOffice server applications proved to be Microsoft's fastest seller here this year.

On the Internet browser side, Mr Roll says the market is split fairly evenly between it and its main competitor in this area, Netscape.

He adds that the core principle of the antitrust case for Microsoft is its fundamental right to innovate and "make great products for its customers". Mr Roll is confident, in the final analysis, Microsoft will not have to be broken up into separate operating decisions.

"It would be like using a sledge hammer to break up a hazelnut. Such action would only harm our customers, and slow our rate of innovation down. The remedy needs to be appropriate to the issues at the heart of the case," Mr Roll says.