Apple and Microsoft are urging the EU to remove iMessage and Bing, respectively, from a list of “gatekeepers” subject to new regulatory requirements. your justification? The companies claim that the services simply aren’t popular enough.
The dispute has its origins in the EU’s new Digital Markets Act, a landmark law designed to limit the power of big tech companies. A key goal of the rules is to prevent digital giants from crowding out smaller competitors by locking users into gated services.
The aim of politics are the so-called gatekeepers – companies that provide “core platform services” that are vulnerable to unfair commercial practices, such as social networks or search engines.
To be called a gatekeeper, companies need either a market capitalization of at least €75 billion or annual sales of €7.5 billion. You need to also offer certain services such as browsers, messengers or social media, which have at least 45 million monthly end users and 10,000 business users annually in the EU.
Companies that meet the criteria face various new obligations, such as making their services compatible with competing apps. Violators face fines of up to 20% of their worldwide sales.
The first list of these gatekeepers is scheduled to be released on Wednesday. Brussels is still considering the inclusion of Apple’s chat app iMessage and Microsoft’s Bing search engine, according to the Financial Times reports. The two tech giants claim their services aren’t popular enough to warrant inclusion.
Microsoft argues that Bing shouldn’t be subject to the same requirements as the much larger Google Search, the Financial Times said, citing two people with direct knowledge of the problem.
Supporters of the company point out that Bing only has a 3% market share. If Microsoft is forced to offer access to competing search engines, the result could only strengthen Google’s existing search monopoly.
Apple, meanwhile, claims that iMessage simply doesn’t have enough EU users to be considered a gatekeeper. Therefore, the company argues that the same requirements should not be placed on the messenger as on Metas WhatsApp.
The result of their lobbying could be announced this week. If the services are designated as gatekeepers, Companies have six months to meet the commitments.