E-commerce giant, MercadoLibre said on Monday it has filed complaints against Apple with antitrust regulators in Brazil and Mexico for anti-competitive practices, accusing the US-based firm of abusing what it called a monopoly in the distribution of apps for its devices.
In a statement, the e-commerce giant said
that Apple had imposed a series of restrictions on the distribution of digital
goods and in-app purchases, including banning apps from distributing
third-party digital goods and services such as movies, music, video games,
books and written content.
In the complaint, the South American
company criticised the California tech giant for requiring developers who offer
digital goods or services within apps to use Apple's own payment system and
stopping them from redirecting buyers to their websites.
"This clearly harms its competitors,
unless they are integrated digital giants themselves, who may even benefit from
this artificial tilt towards integrated ecosystems," Jacobo Cohen Imach,
senior vice president of legal and public affairs said in a statement.
MercadoLibre said the complaints against
Apple had been filed before Brazil's antitrust watchdog CADE and Mexico's
Federal Telecommunications Institute and Federal Economic Competition
Commission.
In the complaint, the South American
company criticised the California tech giant for requiring developers who offer
digital goods or services within apps to use Apple's own payment system and
stopping them from redirecting buyers to their websites."
This clearly harms its competitors, unless
they are integrated digital giants themselves, who may even benefit from this
artificial tilt towards integrated ecosystems," Jacobo Cohen Imach, senior
vice president of legal and public affairs said in a statement. MercadoLibre
said the complaints against Apple had been filed before Brazil's antitrust
watchdog CADE and Mexico's Federal Telecommunications Institute and Federal
Economic Competition Commission.
Apple's policies have been challenged in
nearly every corner of the world over the past few years.
In a U.S. court trial last year over
similar allegations, a judge found that Apple had not violated antitrust law in
part because its rules led to security benefits for users that outweighed any
harm to appmakers.
But the ruling is being appealed, and a
global resolution on the concerns appears distant. Nasdaq-listed MercadoLibre
is one of Latin America's largest companies, with a market capitalization of
$47.53 billion, according to Refinitiv data. Cohen Imach said the e-commerce
giant tried "unsuccessfully" to negotiate with Apple.
"Undoubtedly, we would have preferred to avoid a conflict with the world's largest company; however, we are convinced that we are doing the right thing for the future of competition," he said. © Reuters