UK antitrust regulator opens formal probe into Microsoft's Office and Copilot bundling

Britain's Competition and Markets Authority has opened a formal investigation into whether Microsoft's bundling of Word, Excel, Teams and its Copilot AI assistant into Microsoft 365 subscriptions unfairly disadvantages competing software and AI-assistant makers. The probe adds the UK to a growing list of jurisdictions scrutinizing how dominant software platforms package AI features alongside their core productivity tools. Microsoft has previously defended bundling practices as benefiting customers through simplicity and integrated pricing, and the company is expected to cooperate with the inquiry while contesting its substantive conclusions.