Apple likely to avoid antitrust battles

While US antitrust officials have been taking a more assertive approach in the past 18 months toward technology companies in the general and fast-growing Apple in particular, experts said on June 11 that the rising Silicon Valley powerhouse is likely to avoid the sort of brutal legal battles that beset Microsoft for a decade.

Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission lawyers, emboldened by a broader interpretation of the law, have been making inquiries in recent weeks about Apple's conduct in distributing digital music and in barring iPhone applications created with Flash. Those efforts will be a distraction for Apple and could help make sure it continues to step carefully as the technology landscape shifts and it faces off against competitors in new areas. But the worst-case scenario for the company and its investors - litigation against an opponent backed by bottomless tax coffers - remains only a remote possibility, because of the facts and the state of the law.