Zoom takes on Microsoft in global regulatory dispute. 1 other story and a trivia

This line-up of stories will help you discover the latest happenings around the tech world, today

1. Zoom takes on Microsoft in global regulatory dispute

Zoom Video Communications has filed complaints with regulators worldwide, including the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and European, UK, and German competition authorities, regarding alleged anti-competitive behavior by Microsoft.

Zoom’s concerns primarily revolve around the preferential treatment Microsoft gives to its Teams videoconferencing software through pricing bundling and product design.

Microsoft is currently under investigation by the EU’s competition watchdog over whether bundling Teams with Microsoft 365 and Office 365 violated antitrust rules.

This EU probe originated from a complaint by Salesforce’s Slack three years ago.

Recently, Microsoft announced it would unbundle Teams in Europe from 1 October. In Germany, the Federal Cartel Office has initiated an investigation into Microsoft’s bundling of OneDrive and Teams with its other productivity software.

Both US and UK authorities have initiated inquiries into cloud services, where Microsoft’s Azure plays a significant role. Zoom’s CEO, Eric Yuan, called for the FTC to investigate Microsoft’s bundling practices, emphasizing the importance of fairness in competition.

This dispute reflects the ongoing regulatory scrutiny in the tech industry, with Zoom now actively joining the conversation.

Tech Trivia: What does it mean when an application runs “sandboxed?”

A. It is prevented from accessing the Internet.

B. It is isolated from system resources and other applications.

C. Its source code can be modified while it is running.

D. Its settings are automatically reset to default after the app quits.

Answer: see end of post

 

2. Stitch’s WigWag launches no-code payment solutions

South African payments infrastructure company Stitch has launched WigWag, a new brand aimed at providing SMEs and individual business owners with easy, no-code payment solutions, powered by the Stitch API.

Stitch, founded in 2021, offers a payments infrastructure that helps businesses scale and operate more efficiently.

It has raised $27 million in funding and expanded its offering to include the Stitch payments suite for businesses with complex payment needs.

The latest addition, WigWag, enables small and growing businesses to accept local and international card payments within minutes, without the need for a website or developer resources.

Businesses can simply send a unique payment link to customers through chat or email.

This move by Stitch reflects the demand for simplified and accessible payment solutions, particularly among small businesses looking to streamline their operations and expand their payment capabilities.

Trivia answer: Sandboxing

Sandboxing is a software management strategy that isolates applications from critical system resources and other programs. It provides an extra layer of security that prevents malware or harmful applications from negatively affecting your system.

Without sandboxing, an application may have unrestricted access to all system resources and user data on a computer. A sandboxed app on the other hand, can only access resources in its own “sandbox.” An application’s sandbox is a limited area of storage space and memory that contains the only resources the program requires. If a program needs to access resources or files outside the sandbox, permission must be explicitly granted by the system.

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