Source: Tech Telegraph UK
On Tuesday, April 26, Apple Inc lodged a protest after the release of a government report from Japan. This report showed regulations possibly being introduced to ensure fair competition in the market of smartphone operating system. So far, the market has been dominated by two major tech firms of the US- Apple and Alphabet’s Google. In a statement, the tech giant stated that they “respectfully disagree” with a range of conclusions in the report. It was released on the same day they revealed concerns over the dominance of the two US tech firms in the sector.
Additionally, Apple stated it is presently facing strong ‘competition’ in almost every sector in which it currently operates. The tech giant added that it would go on to interact “constructively with the Japanese government.” On the other hand, Google gave in a separate statement regarding the matter. It said that it has been a part of active cooperation with the government, emphasising on how much it has contributed to this industry. Additionally, it stated that it would further conduct an examination of the particular report.
The U.S. technology giant, Apple said in a statement, “We respectfully disagree with a number of conclusions” in the government report.
An interim report was released after the discussion regarding the competition in the digital market. In it, the government reportedly sees the browsing apps of Apple and Google being preinstalled in smartphone as an issue. Moreover, it proposed the initiation of rules to forbid acts that limit users from making decisions and their own choices. They think that this could systemically remove the space for fair competition.
Additionally, the government went on to specify more of its concerns regarding application developers. This was over them paying a significantly high fee to Apple as they could only distribute their commodities through the store of the tech giant. Moreover, they called for enabling OS providers to give users the ability to select the particular app store of their personal choice.
During the meeting, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno stated why they initiated the organisations of these issues and options. He said that it was in order to realise fair and equal form of competition.
“In order to realize fair and equal competition, we organized various issues and options,”
Subsequently, the government would pay heed to the opinions from the public, and organise more discussions before coming up with the final report.
