Another day, another lawsuit. Or two. Apple faces another European antitrust complaint, this time over its 30% cut on ebooks in the iBookStore, according to the Financial Times (a subscription is required to read the article).
The complaint was made to the European Commission, the European Commission’s antitrust investigative body, by Rakuten’s Kobo subsidiary, Kobo alleges that Apple’s commission rate is anti-competitive when it also promotes its own Apple Books service.
Rakuten Kobo Inc., or simply Kobo, is a Canadian company that sells e-books, audiobooks, e-readers and tablet computers. It’s headquartered in Toronto, Ontario and is a subsidiary of the Japanese e-commerce conglomerate Rakuten.
Apple is also facing formal investigation into alleged anticompetitive practices over both the App Store and Apple Pay. The European Commission has announced the two conduct investigations. Apple could potentially end up being fined up to 10% of its annual revenue.
“It appears that Apple sets the conditions on how Apple Pay should be used in merchants’ apps and websites,” said EU Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager in a statement. “It also reserves the “tap and go” functionality of iPhones to Apple Pay.”
This isn’t the first rodeo when it comes to Apple and the European Commission facing off. For example, In 2018, the EU launched an antitrust investigation regarding the tech giant’s purchase of the Shazam music app/service. It eventually gave the green light to the purchase.
