Vittoria! - Piccola ma Bella

A small but perfectly-formed victory from the Associazione per il Software Libero:

On february the 21st 2006 the Italian Ministry of Work and Social Politics - Department of Technological Innovation published in the Official Journal of the Italian Republic n. 43 a call for tenders for the supply of an amount of Euro 4.539.184,55 of Microsoft software licenses.

This call for tenders allowed to participate only resellers qualified by Microsoft as "Large Account Resellers": just 11 Italian companies comply with this.

According to Italian law, before buying software Public Administrations have to compare all available options, including free software.

In this case such evaluation was omitted and free competition principles were violated: just resellers of one company's products were allowed to compete.

For this reason "Associazione per il Software Libero" decided to appeal this call for tenders before the court (Regional Administrative Tribunal of Lazio-Rome) filing case n. 3838/2006.


Press Release

There is no need to wait for the final decision in the case promoted by the Associazione per il Software Libero against the Ministry of Work and Social Politics before the Administrative Tribunal of Lazio Region appealing the call for tenders for the supply of Microsoft software licenses.

The Ministry withdrawn the call for tenders with act of annullment.

Evviva!