BRUSSELS, Feb 10 (Reuters) - Microsoft ( MSFT ) has

offered to widen the price differential between its Office

product sold with its chat and video app Teams and its software

sold without the app in a bid to avert a possible EU antitrust

fine, according to three sources.

The move by the U.S. tech giant comes five years after

Salesforce ( CRM )-owned Slack complained to the European

Commission about Microsoft's ( MSFT ) tying of Teams with Office. In

2023, German rival alfaview filed a similar grievance to the EU

watchdog.

Teams, which was added to Office 365 in 2017 for free and

eventually replaced Skype for Business, became popular during

the pandemic due in part to its video conferencing.

Making Office with Teams more expensive could help rivals

offer their products at competitive prices and entice users to

switch to them.

Microsoft ( MSFT ) unbundled Teams from Office in 2023, selling

Office without Teams for 2 euros less than Office with the video

app. It said Teams standalone would be sold for 5 euros a month.

The Commission has asked some companies for feedback, giving

them until this week to respond, before it decides whether to do

a formal market test, said the three people, all with direct

knowledge of the matter.

They said Microsoft ( MSFT ) has also offered better interoperability

terms to make it easier for rivals to compete.

The EU competition enforcer and Microsoft ( MSFT ), which racked up

2.2 billion euros ($2.3 billion) in EU antitrust fines two

decades ago for tying or bundling two or more products together,

declined to comment. EU fines can reach 10% of a company's

global annual revenue.

If the Commission does accept Microsoft's ( MSFT ) offer without a

fine or a finding of wrongdoing, it would free up manpower and

resources for its investigations into Apple and Google, one of

the sources said.

($1 = 0.9695 euros)

(Reporting by Foo Yun Chee

Editing by Ros Russell)