The European Commission (EC) said today that it would investigate whether Microsoft will adequately supply for interoperability with the rival OpenDocument Format (ODF) in its Office suite.

The EC said it “has taken note” of Microsoft’s announcement yesterday that it would support ODF in the Microsoft Office suite, which is the dominant set of office applications for desktop and notebook computers. ODF has been supported by Sun Microsystems, IBM, and other companies and organizations, and is tied to the OpenOffice.org suite of office applications, an open-source offering that provides an alternative to Microsoft Office.

‘Regulatory Concerns’

In a statement to news media, the Commission said it would “welcome any step that Microsoft took toward genuine interoperability, more consumer choice and less vendor lock-in.”

Erich Andersen, Microsoft vice-president and associate general counsel, said his company understood that regulators see support for ODF in Office to be a way to promote interoperability, and that Microsoft was making efforts to

help address “regulatory concerns.”

In April, the universal Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the universal Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) approved OOXML as an worldly standard. ISO is a global network of standards-based bodies from more than 150 countries, and the IEC is the leading universal standards organization for electronic technology.

The Open Office XML Specification was developed by Microsooft. It was first approved by the information-technology industry organization Ecma universal, and soon after submitted by Ecma to ISO/IEC under the fast-track procedure. Originally, it was rejected under fast-track, but the rules allowed for a vote at a meeting, and it was eventually approved.

‘Playing for Time’

The European Committee for Interoperable Systems, which represents IBM, Nokia, Sun Microsystems, Oracle and others, told news media that Microsoft was “playing for time” by saying it would not be implementing ODF support in its Office 2007 service pack 2 until early 2009. The intent,…

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