From Mr Bill Veghte.

Sir, Your story “Microsoft in big discounts for Windows 7” (June 26) reported that some European retail consumers would have to pay a higher price to upgrade to Windows 7 as a result of the European case relating to the Internet Explorer web browser. I want to clarify our pricing.

Microsoft recently took steps to address concerns raised by the case, but nothing about this will mean higher prices for Windows 7 in Europe. We typically offer two Windows versions to retail customers: a full version for use on any computer and an upgrade version – at a lower price – that can only be used on computers that are already licensed for Windows. In light of recent changes we made to European versions of Window 7, we will not have an upgrade version available in Europe when we release the new operating system. Therefore, we've decided to offer the full version of Windows 7 to all customers at the lower upgrade price. In the future we may have an upgrade offering of Windows 7 available in Europe, and at that time we would revert to differential pricing of the full and upgrade versions, as we have in the rest of the world. This means that we will always have the lower upgrade pricing available for European consumers who are already licensed for Windows. I hope this is very clear.

I should note that the changes Microsoft recently announced to Windows 7 in Europe were taken unilaterally by us in order to address our legal situation. These changes were not approved in advance by the European Commission. We are committed to complying fully with European legal requirements and to delivering the advances of Windows 7 to European consumers in a timely manner.

Bill Veghte,
Senior Vice President for the Windows Business,
Microsoft Corp