Apple In-App Subscription Rules Raise Antitrust Concerns

Apple's announcement today that forces iOS applications to sell their content through in-app subscription has already begun to cause antitrust concerns, according to the WSJ.

Experts said that the first step in an antitrust analysis is to determine whether Apple is a dominant player in the market, which, in turn, requires an an assessment of the relevant market at issue. Publishers, for example, might claim that Apple dominates the market for consumer tablet computers and that it has allegedly used that commanding position to restrict competition

"My inclination is to be suspect", said Shubha Ghosh, an antitrust professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School. Ghosh's says two important questions are, whether Apple owns enough of a dominant position in the market to keep competitors out, and whether it is exerting "anticompetitive pressures on price."


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