French finance minister takes aim at foreign tech giants, including Apple
France's finance minister took aim at the dominance of foreign tech giants in the European Union on Tuesday, and specifically named Apple as an example.
Credit: AFP
The comments come several months after the European Commission launched an antitrust investigation into Apple platforms such as the App Store and Apple Pay.
During a digital competitiveness event on Tuesday, French Minster of the Economy and Finance Bruno Le Maire criticized the concentration of specific markets in the EU where "a small number of very large international platforms are reaping most of the profits."
Le Maire specifically called out Apple's operations in Europe as an example of foreign businesses that are bad for competitiveness in the region, Euractiv reported.
"Apple's market capitalization is now larger than the capitalization of all the CAC 40," Le Maire said, referring to France's stock market index. "It is a competition issue when these companies develop strategies to lock in their users in their services and ecosystems."
The French finance minister also called for the creation of more "European champions" in the technology industry and other sectors.
Apple first came under antitrust scrutiny after musing streaming platform Spotify filed formal complaints about the App Store in the EU. In addition to the probes in Europe, Apple is also facing scrutiny in the U.S., Russia, and elsewhere.
Credit: AFP
The comments come several months after the European Commission launched an antitrust investigation into Apple platforms such as the App Store and Apple Pay.
During a digital competitiveness event on Tuesday, French Minster of the Economy and Finance Bruno Le Maire criticized the concentration of specific markets in the EU where "a small number of very large international platforms are reaping most of the profits."
Le Maire specifically called out Apple's operations in Europe as an example of foreign businesses that are bad for competitiveness in the region, Euractiv reported.
"Apple's market capitalization is now larger than the capitalization of all the CAC 40," Le Maire said, referring to France's stock market index. "It is a competition issue when these companies develop strategies to lock in their users in their services and ecosystems."
The French finance minister also called for the creation of more "European champions" in the technology industry and other sectors.
Apple first came under antitrust scrutiny after musing streaming platform Spotify filed formal complaints about the App Store in the EU. In addition to the probes in Europe, Apple is also facing scrutiny in the U.S., Russia, and elsewhere.
Comments
The number of users that move back and forth from iOS to Android prove that it's not "lock in", it's that people find something they like and stay there.
This isn't something that popped up overnight, Apple have been operating in the EU for over 40 years (nearly its entire 'lifetime'). They either directly invented or developed the paradigms people have become familiar with in this space.
To talk vaguely about Apple and other tech giants being the benefactor of the rapid development of IT, ignores the reality that it's these companies that have rapidly developed IT, and the likes of Apple have been at this for nearly half a century.
There is no lack of competition in this space, but one would be insane to think that a person will leave their preferred platform for a 3rd party which doesn't offer the features or value. All that these statements show is that certain governments have a long history of bad policy towards IT, and thus aren't there to reap the rewards of it. The USA, Israel, China, Taiwan and South Korea and the like didn't just happen to stumble into this success.
And just a side gripe because I can:
I find it particularly fitting that these statements come from France - France is home to a number of user-hostile IT systems (just try booking a rail ticket), perhaps they'd have more success if they followed the example set by many of their European neighbours.
globalization, capitalism, multinationals are good for the society it seems. In any case the benefits of the current situation are reaped by far less than 20% of the people in earth. The rich pay less taxes on avg and their consuming and their investment gains are subsidized (by central banks)
Can we believe Honestly that this situation is fair?