The European Union will begin an official investigation into the anti-monopoly case filed by Spotify over rival Apple, accusing it of "tilting the market to harm competitors," the Financial Times reported on Monday.
The newspaper pointed out that the investigation comes with the intensification of the battle between companies competing in the market of the music industry. Spotivay, which last month reached 100 million paid subscriptions, is a leader in the audio market but faces increasing competition from major technology companies such as Apple and Amazon.
In March, Sputevay filed a formal complaint with the European Union alleging Apple had acted illegally and abused the dominance of its App Store for its audio service: Apple Music.
The SpotPay complaint focuses on Apple's policy of charging 30% of its payment system for subscriptions sold through its App Store. This policy applies to SpotPay, and other subscription services to music, but not to applications, such as: Ober.
After considering the complaint and conducting a study with clients, competitors and others in the market, the EU Competition Commission decided to launch an official anti-monopoly probe into Apple's behavior, the Financial Times quoted three well-informed sources as saying.
Law enforcement agencies in the European Union may ask companies to change their commercial practices, which they are illegal, and impose fines of up to 10 percent of their worldwide sales. Because investigations do not have specific deadlines, and can take years to resolve, companies may resort to speeding up the process and avoiding fines by offering a settlement of the issues through binding promises of behavior change.
Sputivay is not alone in her discontent with Apple's policies. Other companies, such as Deezer and BEUC, share it. Apple responded to Sputivay's complaint by accusing her of "misleading remarks" and that she had taken advantage of the August Store store for years to increase the number of users, but now wanted to keep all the gains she had made from August Store without offering anything to the store.
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