Microsoft previously separated the two products in Europe last year as it faced a possible EU antitrust fine. Teams was originally added to Office back in 2017, but since a 2020 complaint from rival workspace messaging app Slack, the European Commission has been probing Microsoft's bundling of Office and Teams.

Rival companies claimed that packaging Teams in with its other products gave Microsoft an unfair advantage. Following the complaint, Microsoft began selling the two products separately in the EU and Switzerland on the 1st October 2023.

According to Sensor Tower data, the user base of Microsoft Teams has largely remained stable since it was separated from the Microsoft 365 and Office Suites in Europe in October 2023.

A Microsoft spokesperson told Reuters: “To ensure clarity for our customers, we are extending the steps we took last year to unbundle Teams from M365 and O365 in the European Economic Area and Switzerland to customers globally.

“Doing so also addresses feedback from the European Commission by providing multinational companies more flexibility when they want to standardise their purchasing across geographies.”

Over the last decade, Microsoft has accumulated €2.2 billion in EU antitrust fines for engaging in practices such as tying or bundling multiple products. Should the company be found in violation of antitrust laws again, it faces the possibility of a fine amounting to up to 10% of its global annual revenue.

In 1998, the US Justice Department took legal action against Microsoft, accusing it of exploiting its Windows platform's dominance to undermine competing web browsers. Since then, Microsoft has relaxed its restrictions on the software that computer manufacturers can pre-install, leading to a significant increase in the use of alternative internet browsers.