Apple Likely to Face Charges in EU Over Appstore
Apple’s App Store is one of the prime revenues of the company, sucking billions of dollars from both developers and users. While Apple looks at that as formal business revenue, many companies and indie developers are against the practice of being charged 30% of their revenues. This agony has grown even bigger in the last couple of years, where Apple is targeted by Spotify, Epic Games, Telegram, and others. They have filed lawsuits against the Cupertino-based company, as they’re being restricted by Apple’s practices and cashing themselves by promoting their native apps. One such complaint made by Spotify in March 2019 can have a big hearing this weekend. As per reports, Margrethe Vestager, the EU Antitrust Commissioner, is gearing up to file an antitrust complaint against Apple on Spotify’s case after collecting sufficient evidence to accuse. The Swedish music platform has earlier blamed Apple for charging an exorbitant 30% cut from their subscriptions and made it harder for users to know cheap alternative ways. Further, Spotify accused Apple of blocking Siri (Apple’s voice assistant) from connecting with Spotify users and barring them from launching a Spotify app for Apple Watch. Also, Apple follows discriminatory practices to help elevate its native Apple Music service. While Apple didn’t respond with any formal statement yet, it earlier said that App Store helped Spotify become what it’s today. Also, regarding the 30% cut on subscriptions, Apple clarified that it only charges from paid apps but not free apps. Also, a subscription purchased for more than one year will reduce the cut to 15%, says Apple.
