Apple vs epic outcome2/27/2024 ![]() A broad range of small and medium-sized game makers is necessary to populate its Epic Game Store catalogue but the dollars tell a different story. Their aversion to sharing information is both their greatest strength and greatest weakness.Īnd we’ve learned quite a few things so far.Įpic pays a pittance. To know this industry and its inner workings is a barrier to entry and what platform holders and publishers rely on. Despite the pleas from indies and academics for years, secrecy is an important competitive advantage for incumbents. The games industry at large is conspicuously opaque. I mean, have you seen it? It’s just one deck after another spreadsheet after another chart after another email brimming with supersecret information. But this lawsuit comes with a loot box that has a spectacular drop rate. ![]() If you continue down this path, no good will come of it. All of the things the antitrust laws seek to protect.” “The result for consumers and developers will be: Less security. And its opening statement was nothing short of fear-mongering: From the start, everyone is cast into a new role.Īpple is discovering that throwing stones from its circular glass house in Cupertino is ill-advised: to make its case as a benevolent dictator, the consumer electronics firm sent no fewer than 42 lawyers to take on Epic’s 19. “we’re witnessing a classic example of a complementor, Epic, being non-cooperative with a platform holder.”Īn important reason to avoid a fight is that people get to see a side of you that you may not want them to know. According to my colleague Joost Rietveld, who writes extensively on platform strategy in gaming at the University College of London, I’d welcome a data-driven assessment on how Big Tech maintaining a monopoly position in their respective industries benefits consumers.Ī more nuanced approach comes from academia. But so far, its claims are void of analysis and largely unsubstantiated. There is the pro-business camp, which argues that regulation of the app stores would be disastrous. But-stepping outside of my own industry echo chamber-proponents from both camps have started to emerge. Ultimately, the court determined that Microsoft held a monopoly over the PC market and that it deliberated acted to stifle innovation and competition by making life hard for third-party software.īoth serve either as case studies of effective regulatory control to the benefit of US consumers, or as a warning for American titans, depending on who you ask.Īgainst the broader background of a growing antitrust sentiment, the change in administration, and glaring data and privacy issues, my expectation is that, irrespective of the outcome, the Epic/Apple case will become a critical reference point as governments everywhere try to figure out how to deal with tech monopolies. The latter forced Microsoft to unbundle its internet browser (Internet Explorer) from its operating software (Windows) because it created barriers to entry for other software providers. The breakup brought the phone company’s value down by 70% but oxygenated the market (even if cellular telephony today in the US is still expensive. The former resulted in the breakup of the American telephony system into seven subsidiaries because AT&T held a monopoly. ![]() The Epic/Apple case resembles at least two previous cases that resulted in a change in regulatory policy and a restructuring of industry: the 1984 AT&T divestiture and the 2001 antitrust case United States v. ![]() That, in turn, gives them less leverage and any reductions in the app store rates has an immediate positive impact on their bottom line. Companies like NetEase and Activision Blizzard, the largest ‘pure play’ game publishers, rely on mobile for a substantial part of total revenues. Certainly, they also are vertically integrated to varying degrees. Based on the money they make in interactive entertainment, the six largest firms in the industry are all platform holders.
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