A spokesman for European Union (EU) competition commissioner Neelie Kroes confirmed that she will take into account the views of Microsoft rivals when making a decision, which he indicated could be as early as next month.

"The commission will decide on whether it considers the proposals from Microsoft are satisfactory or not in the light of the reaction in the market place," said spokesman Jonathan Todd.

Microsoft, charged with abusing its dominance of software markets, was ordered last March to pay a 497-million-euro (656-million-dollar) fine, to offer a version of Windows without Media Player and to share server product information to rivals.

In December it lost an appeal to have the punishment suspended before the EU's Court of First Instance which gave Microsoft six weeks to comply with the ruling. That deadline passed earlier this month.

The commission said it has asked Microsofts rivals to give their views on Microsoft's proposed ways of implementing the court ruling -- notably including what the stripped down version of Windows would be called.

The spokesman said Brussels was against a proposal for it to be called "Reduced Media Edition," saying Microsoft should "refrain from using terms that would have the effect of making the unbunbled version less attractive."

The rivals are also known to have concerns about the terms so far offered by Microsoft for sharing vital information needed to develop products that can work smoothly with the Windows platform.

On the timing of an EU decision, Todd said that all contributions from Microsoft rivals were expected by the first week in March. "We'll make up our mind after that," he said, but added: "I can't give you a precise time."

He confirmed that an option if the commission is not happy would be to impose daily fines of up to five percent of Microsoft's, as measured on the previous year's figures, until agreement was reached.

"But it's premature to speculate at this stage that this is what the commision intends to do, because the commission hasn't yet made up its mind as to whether it considers the measures offered by Microsoft to be satisfactory."

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