In California alone, Microsoft works with over 16,000 resellers and develops products in conjunction with more than 1,400 technology partners. This is not to say that what is good for Microsoft is automatically good for California. Indeed, Microsoft competes directly with many well-known California companies, including Apple Computer, Sun Microsystems, and others. In the Microsoft case, the government failed to demonstrate consumer harm, normally the backbone of any anti-trust case. Rather, anyone who walks into the local Comp USA or Best Buy knows that we continue to benefit from falling prices across the technology sector, including hardware, software and services.
Consumers purchase computers today with far more power than just six months ago, at the same price.
Court records show that Joel Klein, the Justice Department's point man on the case, took up the Microsoft cause after repeated meetings with Netscape CEO Jim Barksdale. If consumer harm is not central to the Microsoft case, then the door has been flung open for cases against numerous other high-tech companies. Cisco Systems' market share in the critical Internet server market exceeds 90 percent, and its market capitalization just exceeded Microsoft's. Apple Computer has a 100-percent market share in the Macintosh hardware and operating systems market. Internet appliances that do not use Microsoft systems, then no high-tech company is completely safe from government scrutiny.