The judge in the Microsoft case granted the US government more time in the trial yesterday after it unexpectedly said it might incorporate a few of Microsoft's suggestions into its proposal to split the firm.
District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson gave the government until Monday to provide its observations about Microsoft's latest filing, which had been assumed to be its last. After that, Microsoft will have until Wednesday to add its views.
The Microsoft filing criticised the government's proposals for the break-up and for temporary conduct restrictions, and made extensive suggestions for changing them.
"Some number of those seem to make some sense to us, and we would like the opportunity to go through those in detail and to give the court our view on that," said government lawyer Mr David Boies. Mr Boies said the government would take Microsoft's points, "at least the points we agree with, and try to advise the court of our agreement and why we agree to them".
In New York, Department of Justice antitrust chief Mr Joel Klein said only a few at most would "make the cut".
"We requested the opportunity to analyse those suggestions and there may be a few that are acceptable to us," Mr Klein said. Mr Boies said the government also wanted to explain briefly why it disagreed with many of Microsoft's suggestions.
