The European Commission has fined Apple for €1.84 billion for failing to comply with EU competition rules in the online music market, an unprecedented penalty that the US giant has decided to appeal, AFP reports.
Spotify, the hugely popular music streaming platform, filed a complaint in Brussels against the Californian giant's practices, which were deemed to violate European "fair competition" rules and it said did not "guarantee freedom of choice for consumers and a fair environment for developers".
At the end of the formal investigation, launched in June 2020, the European enforcement authority ruled in favor of the complainant.
"For a decade, Apple abused its dominant position in the market for the distribution of music streaming apps through its AppStore," explained Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager.
She added that the Apple group had introduced restrictions to prevent app developers from promoting to iPhone and iPad users "alternative and cheaper services available outside the Apple ecosystem".
"This is illegal: under EU antitrust rules we have today fined Apple more than €1.8 billion," she said.
The group will also have to end the practices in question and refrain from adopting equivalent systems in the future.
This is the first time the EU has fined Apple for breaching competition rules.
The amount was deemed "proportionate to the worldwide revenues" of the Cupertino, California-based group and "necessary to act as a deterrent," the EU executive said in a statement.
"Such a one-off fine was necessary as a significant proportion of the damages are non-monetary and cannot be properly accounted for on a revenue basis. The fine should be sufficient to deter Apple from repeating this or a similar infringement," the Commission insisted.
The aim is also "to deter other undertakings of similar size and resources from committing the same infringement".
Apple immediately announced that it would appeal against the fine.
The group deplored the penalty, "imposed despite the Commission's inability to find any credible evidence of consumer harm".
The fine "ignores the realities of a thriving, competitive and fast-growing market", the US giant said.
For its part, Apple accused Spotify of trying to take advantage "without paying" of the benefits of the App Store and its "tools and technologies" that have "contributed to making" the Swedish platform "one of the most recognizable brands in the world". /BGNES
