Tech giant's 'gatekeepers' must comply with all new EU digital market rules
Seven companies, mostly made up of US tech giants, have notified the European Commission that they meet the criteria to be classified as "gatekeepers" under the Digital Markets Act (DMA). Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, the owner of TikTok, ByteDance, Meta, Microsoft and Samsung said they met the thresholds set by the EU when passing the new law. According to Reuters, Booking.com also expects to obtain gatekeeper status by the end of the year and will inform the authorities by then.
Gatekeepers are companies with an annual turnover in Europe of at least €7.5 billion ($8.16 billion) in the last three financial years or those with a fair market value at least €75 billion ($81.6 billion) in the last financial year in at least three EU member states. They must also have served over 45 million monthly active end users and over 10,000 annually active business users in the EU for the past three years. These criteria were designed to include the biggest players in the field, since, as the name of the law suggests, it is intended to cover large online platforms that act as "gatekeepers" in digital markets.
Under the DMA, gatekeepers will be prohibited from favoring their own services over those of their rivals and locking users into their ecosystem. They must allow third parties to interoperate with their own services. They should also allow business users to promote their products/services and "contract with their customers outside of the gatekeepers' platform". In the case of Google and Apple, this means that they cannot prevent developers from using payment systems different from their own. Companies also cannot prohibit users from removing pre-installed apps or downloading apps from outside sources. This will mean huge changes for Apple in particular, whose ecosystem was designed as a "walled garden" for a very long time. In December last year, Bloomberg reported that Apple was preparing to allow third-party app stores and parallel loading with the release of iOS 17.
All gatekeepers will be required to comply with all aspects of the DMA in 2024. For now, European authorities will review submissions and designate gatekeepers for specific platform services by September 6.
Seven companies, mostly made up of US tech giants, have notified the European Commission that they meet the criteria to be classified as "gatekeepers" under the Digital Markets Act (DMA). Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, the owner of TikTok, ByteDance, Meta, Microsoft and Samsung said they met the thresholds set by the EU when passing the new law. According to Reuters, Booking.com also expects to obtain gatekeeper status by the end of the year and will inform the authorities by then.
Gatekeepers are companies with an annual turnover in Europe of at least €7.5 billion ($8.16 billion) in the last three financial years or those with a fair market value at least €75 billion ($81.6 billion) in the last financial year in at least three EU member states. They must also have served over 45 million monthly active end users and over 10,000 annually active business users in the EU for the past three years. These criteria were designed to include the biggest players in the field, since, as the name of the law suggests, it is intended to cover large online platforms that act as "gatekeepers" in digital markets.
Under the DMA, gatekeepers will be prohibited from favoring their own services over those of their rivals and locking users into their ecosystem. They must allow third parties to interoperate with their own services. They should also allow business users to promote their products/services and "contract with their customers outside of the gatekeepers' platform". In the case of Google and Apple, this means that they cannot prevent developers from using payment systems different from their own. Companies also cannot prohibit users from removing pre-installed apps or downloading apps from outside sources. This will mean huge changes for Apple in particular, whose ecosystem was designed as a "walled garden" for a very long time. In December last year, Bloomberg reported that Apple was preparing to allow third-party app stores and parallel loading with the release of iOS 17.
All gatekeepers will be required to comply with all aspects of the DMA in 2024. For now, European authorities will review submissions and designate gatekeepers for specific platform services by September 6.
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