The month of March opened with several new features for Apple. Both positive and negative. The positive one is certainly the presentation of the new MacBook Air M3, “the best consumer laptops for AI” according to the company. The negative one instead concerns the salty one fine of 1.8 billion euros imposed by the European Commission for “anti-competitive conduct” against rival companies involved in the music streaming market, such as Spotify.
The response from the company that sees Tim Cook at the helm was not long in coming. But let’s proceed in order.
Why Apple was fined by the European Commission
In the detailed press release (available to everyone here) we read that Apple has abused its dominant position in the streaming app market prohibiting competition from informing consumers as completely as possible about more advantageous subscription prices (by subscribing outside the app).
«For a decade, Apple has abused its dominant position in the market for distributing music streaming apps through the App Store. It did this by preventing developers from informing consumers about alternative, cheaper music services available outside the Apple ecosystem. This is illegal under EU antitrust rules, which is why today we are fining Apple more than 1.8 billion euros“, explains Margrethe VestagerEuropean Commissioner for Competition.
The amount of the fine turned out to be higher than that assumed by the press, which spoke of around 500 million euros. For the Commission, the figure is proportionate to Apple’s global revenues.
But how did we get to today? It all started in 2020, after the complaint presented by Spotify to the antitrust regarding the so-called “Apple Tax”. In addition to complaining about the 30% commission for every single subscription subscribed, the Swedish company at the time also contested the App Store rules, which – according to Daniel Ek – limited communications with customers and marketing possibilities.
Spotify itself commented on the EU’s decision to fine Apple.
This decision sends a very strong message: no company can abuse power to control how other companies interact with their customers. Apple’s rules prevent Spotify and other music streaming services from sharing information about promotions, discounts, subscription prices and other benefits with users (directly, via apps).
Apple’s response
The Cupertino giant wasted no time and immediately responded to the huge fine from the European Commission. For Apple, the latter “failed to uncover any credible evidence” of harm to consumers or anti-competitive behavior.
Furthermore, according to the Californian company, Spotify wants to “rewrite the rules of the App Store” to obtain advantages without paying anything to Appledespite the App Store itself having been crucial to Spotify’s current dominance in the music streaming market (today the share is around 56%).
In the harsh statement, in addition to confirming that within a few days it will release an update (iOS 17.4) to adapt to the DMA, Apple declares that will appeal the EU decision.