On 9 January 2024, Apple offered several commitments under Article 9 Regulation 1/2003 to address the competition concerns of the European Commission in the markets for mobile wallets on iOS, inter alia to ensure effective interoperability with the Near Field Communication (NFC) functionality on iOS. This post will give an initial overview of Apple’s proposed…
As the deadline for compliance with the provisions of the Digital Markets Act is fast approaching, the designated gatekeepers are progressively proposing and implementing changes to their business models (for an extensive analysis of the designated CPSs see here and here). Apple’s recent announcement proposes to implement changes on its operating system (iOS), web browser…
In September 2023, the European Commission (EC) issued its first designation decisions under the Digital Markets Act (DMA) (see the quick-fire reaction to those decisions here). It sets under the regulatory framework’s scope of application six different gatekeepers for twenty-two core platform services. At first glance, the designation decisions seemed straightforward enough: the European Commission…
TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, is currently bluffing before the EU Courts in the face of its gatekeeper designation decision issued by the Commission last September (the Decision). On 15 November 2023, ByteDance confirmed that it was appealing the Decision before the General Court, and a couple of days after that, the Court of Justice acknowledged…
The Digital Markets Act has been analysed from a myriad of prisms, both from the public and private enforcement perspectives. However, less attention has been dedicated to analysing the actual content of private enforcement via collective actions, as set out explicitly in Articles 42 and 52 of the DMA. Article 42 DMA establishes that “Directive…
On 7 November 2023, a new amendment law to the German Competition Act (“Gesetz gegen Wettbewerbsbeschränkungen”, GWB) came into force. Because it is the 11th major amendment, it is commonly referred to as the 11th GWB Amendment (11. GWB-Novelle). In addition to numerous small alterations, it is particularly noteworthy for three important novelties: New…
Next 16 November 2023, the deadline for the designated gatekeepers on the 5th of September 2023 to appeal the Commission’s decisions will come to an end (for a review of the decisions, see here). Up until this moment, reporting has only documented that Apple would be considering challenging the Commission’s decisions and is prone to…
Introduction On September 26th, the European Commission prohibited the acquisition of the online flight booking service eTraveli by Booking Holdings, the leading provider of online hotel bookings in the European Economic Area (EEA). The Commission argues that the acquisition would have strengthened Booking’s dominant position in the market for online hotel bookings by enabling it…
On 9 October 2023, the European Commission (EC) issued four templates on its official website pertaining to the Digital Markets Act (DMA). Each of them deals with a different provision enshrined in the regulatory framework. First of all, the European Commission published its updated Template for Reporting pursuant to Article 11 of the DMA following…
On 5 October 2023, the German competition authority adopted its first tangible evidence of enforcement surrounding its new competition rules (Section 19a GWB) directed at undertakings with paramount significance for competition across markets on its case against Google for its data processing terms (see the Bundeskartellamt’s decision designating Alphabet here and a previous comment on…
