The US Justice Department is close to bringing an antitrust suit against Microsoft Corp, officials said yesterday, adding that negotiations with Microsoft are in the final stages: Microsoft is still trying to persuade the Justice Department not to bring a civil lawsuit stemming from the long-running federal antitrust investigation but an announcement in the case could come soon, although it still could be delayed at the last-minute by the negotiations or by company appeals to senior Clinton administration officials to review the case, the officials said: issues being investigated include Microsoft’s practice of offering discount prices on MS-DOS to personal computer makers that pay a royalty for each machine they make, closing potential markets to rivals; its use of hidden codes and other methods to tailor Windows system for its own applications, and nondisclosure agreements that Microsoft asks outsiders to sign when they receive pre-release copies of the company’s software, Reuters noted.
