Stewart Butterfield publicly addressed Microsoft Teams on stage at Wall Street Journal’s Tech Live conference in Laguna Beach and exposed some alarming information about some of Microsoft’s “unsportsmanlike” tactics used against Slack.
Microsoft published this chart during Slack’s quiet period prior to its direct listing, in which Slack could not publicly respond due to SEC rules. This was done intentionally to hurt Slack’s direct listing and public reputation knowing fully that Slack could not defend itself. Smart? Perhaps, but also a bit low.
Microsoft has been rumored to pay companies to use Microsoft Teams. It is already aggressive for Microsoft to bundle Teams with Office 365 for free, but to provide monetary incentives to use Teams is starting to touch on anti-competitiveness and Microsoft has a lot of experience with that. Remember Microsoft was found guilty of abusing its monopolistic powers to have Internet Explorer installed on every single PC in the 1990’s.
We know that Bill Gates vetoed on an opportunity to buy Slack in 2016, and decided to transform Skype in to a Slack competitor. We also know from well documented sources that Gates was merciless when it came to business. Paul Allen, a Microsoft co-founder, even called Gates a “ruthless schemer” in his memoir recalling a time when he overheard Gates discussing diluting his shares in the company he co-founded while he was recovering from lymphoma. And while Gates is no longer actively managing Microsoft, he is still more involved at Microsoft than headlines would have you believe.
Past behaviors point to Gates heavily influencing Microsoft's decision to attack Slack with borderline anti-competitive and monopolistic tactics. And while all of Washington, DC is focused on breaking up Facebook, Amazon and Google, Microsoft seems to have a free pass to push its weight around without any legal repercussions. If past behavior is any indication, Microsoft will take its fight with Slack to the legal limit - and perhaps then some.
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