Tag: antitrust

Fortnite Maker Epic Games Moots Google Play Store Reforms After Antitrust Win

Fortnite video game maker Epic Games has urged a federal judge in California to force Google to open up its Play Store to greater competition after a jury found the U.S. tech giant had abused its power as a gatekeeper for apps on the Android mobile platform.

Epic made its proposal in a court filing on Thursday to U.S. District Judge James Donato in San Francisco, seeking in part to require Google Play Store to allow users more freedom in how they download apps and to limit Google’s ability to make agreements with device makers to restrict preloading of competing app stores.

Epic said in a statement on Friday it should be allowed to bring its Epic Games Store to Android “without delays and barriers.” The company also said consumers and developers must have greater control over “how they make and offer in-app purchases, free from anticompetitive fees and restrictions.”

Responding to Epic, Google in a statement on Friday said the court filing “shows again that [Epic] simply wants the benefits of Google Play without having to pay for it.” Google said “Android is an open mobile platform that faces fierce competition” from Apple and other competitors.

Donato presided over a blockbuster antitrust trial that ended in a jury verdict against Alphabet-owned Google in December.

Donato is not bound to grant Epic’s proposal, and a hard fight is likely before any permanent order on Google is issued. But the new filing sets up the next key test of Google’s ability to impose controls on app developers and consumers.

The jury in December said Google unlawfully impeded developers’ ability to freely distribute their apps outside of Google’s Play Store and kept an overly tight grip on payments for transactions within apps. Google imposes an industry standard 30% commission on many apps and in-app purchases.

Google has defended its app store practices and denied any wrongdoing. The company has a May 3 deadline to respond to Epic’s proposal. Epic’s lawsuit did not demand monetary damages.

Epic CEO Tim Sweeney has said Google’s December settlement did not go far enough to restore Play Store competition.

North Carolina-based Epic Games is a privately held company, in which China’s Tencent owns a 40% stake and Walt Disney owns a stake of about 9% as of February.

Google separately in December agreed to pay $700 million to resolve state and consumer allegations over its Play Store restrictions.

The company said then it was expanding the ability of app and game developers to provide consumers an alternative billing option for in-app purchases. Google said it had piloted “choice billing” in the U.S. for more than a year.

Google has said it will appeal the December antitrust jury verdict, and it can separately challenge any reforms ordered by Donato, which could stretch the case for years.

A similar case Epic lodged against Apple in 2020, challenging its grip on its App Store, is still being fought after a non-jury trial and appeals.

© Thomson Reuters 2024

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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Apple Worked on Support for Apple Watch on Android Smartphones for Three Years: Report

Apple spent a few years attempting to bring support for its Apple Watch to Android smartphone, the company reportedly stated in its response to the US Department of Justice (DoJ) lawsuit filed against the firm on Wednesday. Previous reports shed some light on the company’s efforts to introduce support for its smartwatches on phones running on Google’s smartphone operating system, but this is the first confirmation from Apple that the company previously wanted to launch an Apple Watch that worked with Android phones.

The company’s response (via 9to5Mac) to the US DoJ lawsuit states that the company considered supporting the Apple Watch on Android handsets. Owing to technical limitations discovered over a three-year period, the company reportedly decided to drop its plans to expand support for its smartwatches beyond the iPhone.

The 88-page US DoJ lawsuit accuses Apple of violating US antitrust laws (federal and state) including allegedly reducing the quality of cross platform messaging (iMessage exclusivity), diminishing functionality of non-Apple smartwatches (limiting Apple Watch to iPhone), supressing cloud streaming for games on iOS, and blocking third-party apps from offering Apple Pay’s tap-to-pay functionality.

Apple told the publication that the lawsuit “threatens who we are and the principles that set Apple products apart in fiercely competitive markets”, adding that it plans to “vigorously defend” against the US DoJ’s lawsuit, which it believes is “wrong on the facts and the law”.

Last year, Bloomberg reported that Apple’s engineers were “deeply engaged” in an effort called “Project Fennel” that aimed at bringing both the Apple Watch and the company’s Health app to Android smartphones. The project was cancelled when the work was about to be completed, to allow the wearable to continue to push Apple’s iPhone sales, as per the report.

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Microsoft, Meta and X Join Fortnite Maker Epic Games’ Battle Against Apple

Meta Platforms, Microsoft, Elon Musk’s X and Match Group on Wednesday joined “Fortnite” video game maker Epic Games’ protest that Apple has failed to honor a court-ordered injunction governing payments in its lucrative App Store.

The technology companies, which developed some of the most popular apps in the App Store, said Apple was in “clear violation” of the Sept. 2021 injunction by making it difficult to steer consumers to cheaper means to pay for digital content.

Apple declined to comment specifically on the accusation, which was contained in a filing with the Oakland, California federal court.

It referred to its Jan. 16 statement that it had fully complied with the injunction, which it said would protect consumers and “the integrity of Apple’s ecosystem” while ensuring that developers do not get a free ride.

Epic had sued Apple in 2020, saying it violated antitrust law by requiring consumers to obtain apps through the App Store and charging developers up to 30% commissions on purchases.

The injunction required Apple to let developers provide links and buttons to direct consumers to alternative payment options.

Last week, Epic demanded that Apple be held in contempt, saying new rules and a new 27% fee on developers made the links effectively useless.

In Wednesday’s filing, the technology companies said Apple’s conduct “for all practical purposes” entrenches anti-steering rules that the court found illegal, propping up Apple’s “excessive” commissions and harming consumers and developers.

“Apple’s restrictions on where and how developers can communicate with their users about their options for purchasing in-app content create significant barriers to competition and artificially inflate prices,” the filing said.

In January, the U.S. Supreme Court decided not to hear Apple’s appeal from the injunction. It also decided against hearing Epic’s appeal of lower court findings that Apple’s policies did not violate federal antitrust law.

Apple has until April 3 to formally respond to Epic’s filing. The company is based in Cupertino, California, while Epic is based in Cary, North Carolina.

The case is Epic Games Inc v Apple Inc, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, No. 20-05640.

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(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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CCI to Probe Google Amidst Dispute With Indian Firms Over In-App Billing Policy

India’s antitrust body on Friday ordered a probe into Alphabet Inc’s Google in an ongoing dispute with local startups over its in-app billing system, saying the U.S. company implemented its policies in a “discriminatory manner”.

Indian startups have been at odds with Google for months over the fee it charges for in-app payments.

The dispute escalated earlier this month after Google removed more than 100 Indian apps from its app store for violations related to billing, though it restored them after the Indian government intervened.

The startups had asked the Competition Commission of India (CCI) to look into the matter and the watchdog on Friday ordered an investigation, saying: “Google is implementing its policies in a discriminatory manner”.

The CCI also directed its investigation unit to complete the probe within 60 days.

“We are examining CCI’s order initiating the investigation,” a Google spokesperson said in an emailed response to Reuters, adding that the company will cooperate with the process “in every way”.

The dispute centres on efforts by some Indian startups to stop Google from imposing a fee of 11% to 26% on in-app payments, after the country’s antitrust authorities ordered it to dismantle a system of charging 15% to 30% in 2022.

Google denies wrongdoing and says it charges the fee for supporting investments in Google Play app store and the Android mobile operating system, ensuring it distributes it for free.

The CCI has already spent months looking into startups’ complaint that Google is not following the earlier antitrust directive that prevents it from taking adverse measures against companies which use alternate billing systems.

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Apple’s Plan to Comply With EU’s DMA Regulation ‘Farce’, Spotify Says

Spotify said on Friday that Apple’s new plan to comply with the European Union’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) is “a complete and total farce.”

From early March, developers will be able to offer alternative app stores on iPhone and opt out of using Apple’s in-app payment system, which charges commissions of up to 30 percent, under the bloc’s new rules.

However, developers will still be required to pay a “core technology fee” of EUR 50 (roughly Rs. 4,500) per user account per year under Apple’s new EU regime.

“From the beginning, Apple has been clear that they didn’t like the idea of abiding by the DMA. So they’ve formulated an undesirable alternative to the status quo,” the music streaming-giant said on Friday.

Spotify said it would have to pay a 17 percent commission if it stays in the App Store and offers its own in-app payment under the new terms.

“Every developer can choose to stay on the same terms in place today. And under the new terms, more than 99 percent of developers would pay the same or less to Apple,” Apple said in an emailed statement to Reuters.

Apple faces strong action if changes to its App Store do not meet incoming regulations, the bloc’s industry chief exclusively told Reuters on Friday.

© Thomson Reuters 2024

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Apple Plans to Review Sideloaded iOS Apps, Charge Developers for Downloads Outside App Store: Report

Apple is expected to enable support for sideloading apps on iOS by March 6 to comply with the European Union’s Digital Markets Act (DMA), and details of the company’s plans to deal with the changes are now emerging. While the company is yet to announce when support for installing applications outside the App Store will be allowed in the EU, a report states that the company will set up processes to review — and possibly charge developers for — these apps.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Apple plans to enable support for sideloading iOS apps in the EU but will also implement new methods to review apps that are installed outside the App Store. While the iPhone maker currently has full control over how apps are distributed on its smartphones — including vetting and reviewing individual app updates — that is set to change in March when users in the EU will be able to install applications outside the App Store.

It is currently unclear how Apple will restrict apps that are not distributed outside the App Store, but the company uses a security mechanism called Gatekeeper that enforces code signing and download verification of apps downloaded outside the macOS App Store. Apple can technically revoke the certificates for malicious apps, preventing them from running on a user’s device. It is also unclear how Apple plans to review apps that are sideloaded by users on iOS.

The report also states that Apple is considering charging developers for apps sideloaded outside the App Store. The iPhone maker collects between 27 percent to 30 percent of all app purchases and in-app purchases (IAPs) on the App Store, and the company is expected to lose out on the revenue from app developers who choose to distribute their apps outside the App Store.

It remains to be seen whether Apple will enable support for sideloading with the arrival of iOS 17.4 in the coming weeks or whether the functionality can be enabled with the existing code on iOS 17.3 that was rolled out earlier this week. As the DMA deadline approaches, we can expect to learn more about Apple’s plans to deal with iOS app sideloading in the EU in the coming weeks. 

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Spotify to Allow In-App Purchases for Subscriptions, Audiobooks on iPhone in Europe After March DMA Deadline

Spotify users in Europe from March will be able to buy audiobooks and subscription plans from within the music-streaming app as a result of the region’s new competition law for Big Tech, the Swedish company said on Wednesday.

The move will help the company avoid Apple’s 30 percent fee for purchases through its App Store, which has long been a source of contention between app developers and the tech giant.

Spotify has for years been in embroiled in a legal battle, alleging that it was forced to raise the price of its monthly subscriptions to cover costs tied to Apple’s App Store rules.

“For years Apple had these rules where we couldn’t tell you about offers, how much something costs, or even where or how to buy it,” Spotify said in a blogpost.

“The DMA (Digital Markets Act) means that we’ll finally be able to share details about deals, promotions, and better-value payment options in the EU.”

Under the DMA, which all Big Tech firms must comply with by March 7, companies are obligated to treat their own products and services like they do rivals’.

Apple plans to challenge the European Union’s decision to put all of App Store into the bloc’s new digital antitrust list, Bloomberg News had reported in November.

On Tuesday, Apple asked a London tribunal to throw out a mass lawsuit worth around $1 billion brought on behalf of more than 1,500 app developers over its App Store rules.

Apple had also drawn criticism from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg who called App Store policies and fee structure as problematic and causing a conflict of interest.

“We’ve always been interested in helping developers distribute their apps, and new options would add more competition in this space,” Meta said on Wednesday.

“Developers deserve more ways to easily get their apps to the people that want them.”

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Meta Allows EU Users to Access Instagram, Facebook, Messenger Separately to Comply With Regulations

Facebook parent Meta will allow users in the European Union, European Economic Area, and Switzerland to prevent information from being shared across the company’s apps. As a result, people who live in these regions will be able to use Instagram and Facebook separately, even if they are connected on the platform. Meanwhile, Meta will also allow users to create a Messenger account that is not linked to their Facebook account while changing how messaging on the company’s Marketplace platform works.

In a detailed post explaining the changes being made to comply with regulations — the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) — that Meta and other firms must comply with, the company says that users in the EU, EEA, and Switzerland who have already linked their Facebook and Instagram accounts can continue to operate these accounts, or unlink their accounts “so that their information is no longer used across accounts”.

Meta’s announcement comes a month after Instagram-Messenger cross app chats were shut down. Three years after CEO Mark Zuckerberg said Meta would allow users to chat across its services, the company limited messaging to each platform. It also turned on support for end-to-end encrypted (E2EE) chats on Messenger in December.

Meanwhile, the company is also changing how users in these regions can use Messenger — while you can continue to chat using your Facebook account, Meta will also let you sign up for a new Messenger account that operates independently of your existing account. You’ll be able to send messages and call your contacts, but some features won’t work as expected.

For example, Messenger features for Marketplace that allow sellers to chat with buyers will be replaced with an option to use email, if their accounts are unlinked. Similarly, users who unlink their accounts from Facebook Gaming won’t have access to multiplayer features and targeted recommendations, according to the company.

Just like Meta’s optional ad-free subscription for Facebook and Instagram that was introduced two months ago, these changes will only be available to users in the EU, EEA, and Switzerland. The company could also bring the same functionality to other regions if legislation similar to the DMA is passed, allowing users in more countries to operate their accounts independently.

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US Supreme Court Rejects Appeals From Apple, Epic Games Over App Store Antitrust Ruling

The US Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to hear a challenge by Apple to a lower court’s decision requiring changes to certain rules in its lucrative App Store, as the justices shunned the lengthy legal battle between the iPhone maker and Epic Games, maker of the popular video game Fortnite.

The justices also turned away Epic’s appeal of the lower court’s ruling that Apple’s App Store policies limiting how software is distributed and paid for do not violate federal antitrust laws. The justices gave no reasons for their decision to deny the appeals.

Apple’s stock fell more than 2 percent in early trading on Tuesday.

In a social media post, Epic CEO Tim Sweeney said, “The court battle to open iOS (Apple’s mobile operating system) to competing stores and payments is lost in the United States. A sad outcome for all developers.”

Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Epic filed an antitrust lawsuit in 2020, accusing Apple of acting as an illegal monopolist by requiring consumers to get apps through its App Store and buy digital content inside an app using its own system. Apple charges up to a 30 percent commission for in-app purchases.

US District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in 2021 rejected Epic’s antitrust claims against Apple. But the judge found that Apple violated California’s unfair competition law by barring developers from “steering” users to make digital purchases that bypass Apple’s in-app system, which Epic contends could save them money with lower commissions.

The San Francisco-based 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals upheld much of Rogers’ decision in 2023, finding that Epic had “failed to prove the existence of substantially less restrictive alternatives” to Apple’s system.

The judge’s injunction requires Apple to let app developers provide links and buttons that direct consumers to other ways to pay for digital content that they use in their apps.

Sweeney wrote on his social media post: “As of today, developers can begin exercising their court-established right to tell US customers about better prices on the web.”

In its appeal to the Supreme Court, Epic had said that the 9th Circuit’s decision “guarantees severe anticompetitive harm and effectively insulates the most monopolistic tech-platform practices from antitrust scrutiny.”

Apple had noted in its appeal that Epic did not file a class-action lawsuit and said the broad injunction imposed by Rogers exceeds the constitutional authority of federal courts, which typically should be limited to providing relief to the parties before them.

© Thomson Reuters 2024

Will the Nothing Phone 2 serve as the successor to the Phone 1, or will the two co-exist? We discuss the company’s recently launched handset and more on the latest episode of Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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Spotify Allowed to Sidestep Play Store Fees as Part of Confidential Deal, Google Executive Says

Google allowed Spotify to sidestep the company’s mandatory Play Store fees, a company executive reportedly confirmed while giving testimony during the ongoing Epic vs Google trial. The Verge reports that a confidential deal with the streaming giant has come to light, revealing that Spotify was allowed to process its own payments on the service without paying Google a commission. The search giant previously sought to protect the details of its deal with Spotify under wraps during the ongoing case with Fortnite maker Epic Games.

According to the report, Google’s head of partnership Don Harrison testified during the ongoing Epic vs Google trial that Spotify did not pay the company any fees when it processed customer payments on its own. If customers chose to pay Spotify via Google’s in-app billing service, the platform paid Google a 4 percent commission.

Google charges most publishers on its platform a 15 percent cut of all app purchases and in-app purchases, but this figure can be lowered in South Korea, India, and 35 other countries where the company offers developers an alternative — user choice billing — that reduces the commission by 4 percent.

The report states that aside from the music streaming platform’s popularity on Android, the Google executive also testified that the search giant and Spotify had agreed to a “success fund” that would see each firm commit $50 million (roughly Rs. 410 crore).

It is worth noting that while Spotify might be receiving special treatment from Google, the company is still liable to pay the in-app purchase commission — that can go up to 30 percent of each transaction — on Apple’s App Store. Like Netflix and many other services, the streaming service doesn’t allow users to purchase a subscription via the Spotify app on iOS.

It’s too early to tell whether these revelations will have an impact on Epic Games’ case against Google. The game publisher sued both Apple and Google over their alleged antitrust practices that include preventing the use of alternative billing systems and alternative app stores on iOS and Android, respectively. The trial has revealed a lot of interesting details about Google and other firms — including a multibillion-dollar deal with Samsung to have the Play Store, Assistant, and Search apps as defaults on Galaxy smartphones.

The Epic vs Apple trial ended earlier this year when the Ninth Circuit Court affirmed a 2021 decision that found the iPhone maker’s ban on competing app stores on iOS did not violate US antitrust law. Apple lost only one claim in the trial — the firm would have to allow developers to allow links to external payment systems inside their apps. Epic has appealed the verdict at the US Supreme Court, while Apple has asked the court to strike down the ninth circuit court’s order blocking its anti-steering rules.

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