Competition Archives

Meta is appealing the designation of its instant messaging platform Messenger and intermediation service Marketplace that would make them subject to Europe's strict regime of ex-ante rules. Under the Digital Markets Act, tech companies that have acquired such a dominant position …

EU policymakers should have the "courage and fair-mindedness" to pursue a sovereign cloud and regulate American cloud providers under the EU antitrust law on digital markets, Michel Paulin, CEO of the leading French provider OVHcloud, told Euractiv in an interview.

Google and the largest EU telecommunications operators called on the European Commission to designate Apple's iMessage under the Digital Markets Act, which would oblige it to grant interoperability with other messaging services, in a letter seen by Euractiv.

The European Data Protection Board said Wednesday (1 November) it had adopted a binding decision that will ban Facebook and Instagram owner Meta from using the personal data of users for targeted ads without their explicit consent.

Commissioner Thierry Breton supported the need to find a financing model for investment in the EU telecom sector and advocated for more control and security in its infrastructure in view of the sector's growing geopolitical significance and competition with the US and China.

Thierry Breton, the EU Commissioner for the Internal Market, unveiled the core proposals of a highly awaited EU telecom legislation, the Digital Networks Act (DNA), where he supported the concentration of telecom operators and the creation of EU telecom "champions".

A comprehensive bill aiming to secure and regulate the internet in France aims to strictly respect the new digital European regulations and, when it comes to cloud regulation, will go even further.

The EU has set its 2030 ambitions in terms of egovernance, digital businesses and skills, which need to be supported by qualitative telecom infrastructure. This is the goal of the Gigabit Infrastructure Act. The Digital Decade Targets are a Download PDF  

Under EU Merger Regulation rules, the European Commission on Monday (25 September) blocked the merger of Booking.com and eTraveli, citing the former's already dominant market position. Booking.com, an online accommodation and travel site, was set to takeover eTraveli, a flight-centric travel …

Microsoft is getting closer to a successful merger with video game-holding company Activision Blizzard, as the British Competition and Markets Authority said on Friday (22 September) that the revised offer from the tech giant sufficiently addressed their concerns.

During a debate on Wednesday (20 September), European Commission and Parliament representatives shared similar positions on harmonisation rules, such as the tacit approval of permit granting and fibre rollout, putting pressure on member states to come closer to their viewpoints.

Members of the European Parliament agreed on a compromise text on the short-term rentals regulation on Tuesday (12 September), settling debates regarding hosts' liability, conduction and regularity of checks and sanctions.

With the aim to bring high connectivity for all Europeans by 2030, the Parliament agreed on an ambitious text pushing towards EU harmonised rules for telecoms, abolition of extra fees for intra-EU calls and adoption of the principle of administrative tacit approval. 

EU lawmakers are divided on whether industry-specific provisions on illegal online content should be voted on amid a dispute on whether they could contradict the bloc's flagship Digital Services Act (DSA).

This week's Euractiv’s Tech Brief Podcast looks at the specific business model of tower companies and their potential regulation under a new EU legislation: the Gigabit Infrastructure Act.

The European Commission unveiled on Wednesday (6 September) its list of online services designated as "gatekeepers", which will now have six months to adapt to strict antitrust practices or face up to 20% global annual turnover fines.

Following steps by many English-language media, a series of French media groups including Radio France and France24 have decided to block a feature by OpenAI’s GPTBot from collecting their content online.

The European Commission opened a formal investigation on Microsoft on Thursday (27 July) over concerns the company might have bundled its collaboration product Teams with its productivity software part of the Office package.

France's Competition Authority suspects Apple of abusing a dominant market position and being non-transparent in how it tracks iOS users, according to a statement of objections sent to the company on Tuesday (25 July). In 2020, French trade associations representing the …

The European Commission opened on Tuesday (25 July) a formal investigation into French multimedia conglomerate Vivendi’s acquisition of publisher Lagardère over fears that the deal was implemented before the EU authority's green light.

The European Commission's appointment of an American economist to a top job in its competition department has prompted a backlash from French politicians, with the digital minister "inviting the Commission to re-examine the matter".

The Court of Justice of the European Union released its judgement on Thursday (13 July), asking the General Court to reassess its annulment of the European Commission stoppage of the O2-Hutchison merger worth £13 billion. A month before the Brexit referendum …

Discussions among member states on the EU's new telecom law point to providing countries with extensive flexibility, thus turning the regulation into a text reading more like a directive, but the main point of contention remains the 'tacit approval' principle.

The EU competition department green-lighted the US semiconductor company Broadcom’s proposed $61 billion acquisition of the cloud computing and visualisation company VMware on Wednesday (12 July) under certain conditions. In December 2022, the Commission opened an in-depth investigation under the EU …