What is "embrace, extend and extinguish"

phr. A strategy of marketing that involves extending widely used standards of product categories with proprietary capabilities, and then using the differences to disadvantage its competitors.

"Embrace, extend, and extinguish", also known as "Embrace, extend, and exterminate", is a phrase that the U.S. Department of Justice found that was used internally by Microsoft to describe its strategy for entering product categories involving widely used standards, extending those standards with proprietary capabilities, and then using those differences to disadvantage its competitors.