Mercado Livre has filed complaints against the US-based Apple in Brazil and Mexico. According to the company, the complaint was due to breach of rules in competition practices, since the electronics giant would be imposing restrictions on the distribution of digital goods and on in-app purchases for the iOS system.
In the complaint, Mercado Livre mentions that the restrictions occur for services such as movies, music, video games, books, written content, etc. This prohibition, which does not apply to Apple itself, has serious anti-competitive effects, such as:
+ Mercado Livre has a 10% increase in sales on Black Friday and 19% in the week
- Prevents the emergence of other distributors of digital goods and services on iOS devices. In this way, Apple prevents Mercado Livre, or any other economic agent, from operating in the distribution of digital goods and services produced by third parties and competing with Apple, which offers this service;
- Restricts distribution of content that competes with Apple. MercadoLibre’s applications and those of other economic agents can be an access channel for video streaming services or ebooks that compete with Apple’s offerings in those markets.
The complaint was filed before the Federal Institute of Telecommunications (IFT) and the Federal Competition Commission (COFECE), in Mexico, and the Administrative Council for Economic Defense (CADE), in Brazil
The ban prevents the producers of these goods from having an alternative distribution channel and, therefore, artificially restricts both their ability to compete with Apple and to acquire the necessary scale to allow them to recoup their investments.
Another restriction denounced by Mercado Livre is that Apple obliges developers, who offer digital goods or services within applications, to use only its payment processor.
This second restriction has already been denounced by other developers and has been investigated by various competition authorities around the world, such as the European Commission, the CMA in the United Kingdom, the ACM in the Netherlands, the Bundeskartellamt in Germany, the ACCC in Australia, the KFTC of South Korea, JFTC of Japan, CCI of India and ICC of Indonesia.
#Mercado #Livre #denouncing #Apple #Understand