European Commission Specification Proceedings
The European Commission has initiated two specification proceedings to guide Apple towards compliance with its interoperability obligations under the DMA. These latest proceedings focus on iOS connectivity features for connected devices and the process Apple has established for addressing interoperability requests from developers.
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The first proceeding targets iOS functionalities predominantly used by connected devices such as smartwatches, headphones, and virtual reality headsets. The EU intends to specify how Apple should provide effective interoperability with features like notifications, device pairing, and connectivity.
The second proceeding examines the transparency, timeliness, and fairness of Apple’s process for handling interoperability requests from developers and third parties for iOS and iPadOS.
The upshot seems to be to allow third-party accessories to have the same benefits as Apple’s own accessories, like the Apple Watch and AirPods. Some of this is work Apple’s already done with iOS 18’s new accessory pairing feature, which it’s now incumbent upon third-party developers to embrace. Ultimately, the experience for third-party accessories should be much closer to that of AirPods.
But at the end of the day, a lot of what makes AirPods better is the fact that it’s using Apple designed hardware, like the H-series chips instead of standard Bluetooth. I have difficulty imaging that the EC would require Apple to make that hardware available to third parties.
I don’t think that would make sense, but maybe they would try to require that iOS support software so that other companies could make AirPods competitors.
Apple prides itself on its tight integration between hardware and software, and the EC is determined to open that up for the benefit of all hardware manufacturers. While I think that is a good goal, we’re getting very close to the EU editing APIs, which I find hard to imagine will lead to an optimal outcome for Apple, third-party manufacturers, or consumers. However, if you accept the goal as worthwhile, it’s just as hard to imagine accomplishing it any other way given Apple’s apparent unwillingness to open iOS up itself.
‘The DMA isn’t prescriptive enough!’
Careful what you wish for. 😏 If you can’t follow the spirit of the law, get ready for the detailed specifications.
As ever with the Commission and their bureaucratese, I’m unsure whether this announcement is perfunctory or an escalation. But I think it’s an escalation, and they’re so irritated by Apple’s refusal to cave to the “spirit” of the DMA while complying with the letter of the law, that they’re simply going to tell Apple exactly what they want them to do in six months.
In other words, this feels a lot like one last push by Vestager to get Apple to comply with the continually vague “opening up” things they’re looking for – but really, it also feels like one last time in the spotlight and in the headlines for Vestager on this high-profile issue, as she has about a month remaining on her tenure.
Not only that, but it’s starting to sound like the EU is going to be taking a different approach to regulation – or at least looking at if they should – following Mario Draghi’s competition report, which was fairly damning of the ways the body currently operates and approaches regulation, among other things.
Previously:
- Apple’s DMA Compliance, Summer 2024
- Apple Commits to Opening NFC in EU
- Can Anyone But a Tech Giant Build the Next Big Thing?
- Trying to Bring Apple Watch to Android
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Understanding that bureaucrats gonna bureaucrat, one does begin to wonder whether the EC is just entertaining itself by seeing how far it can push Apple (and others) before the companies decide the market isn’t worth the hassle and just stop selling there. Or perhaps they think that if they make their market inhospitable enough to outside business, some European alternative will have space to emerge?
@OUG Split up Google if you want - their whole purpose for doing anything is to increase ad revenue for themselves. Leave Apple alone - the integration is worth it to me.
@DJ they're not against the device integration. They just that other devices are able to be integrated too. That's a huge win for the consumer, the right to choose whatever device (s)he likes.
Oh, I get that. But I still maintain that that is wrong. Apple developed all of this tightly integrated gear to work together on their platform(s), so why shouldn't they be able to keep it closed?
Because monopolies are anti-competitive and the EU's reason for existing is to foster a competitive market. (Naysayers like Gruber would say an uncompetitive market, but I digress).
I tend to support breaking monopolies since among other reasons, anti-competitive markets waste resources, which is environmentally unfriendly.
Apple is free to peddle its wares in other parts of the world where other rules apply instead of refusing to leave and refusing to accept that they are the guest outside of the US, and when in Rome it is polite to do as a Roman.
Yeah, how did that work out for the Romans? ;-)
Seriously though, Apple is not a monopoly.
If a company can't maintain an integrated product set to their benefit, what is there incentive to innovate? To do all the work and then let others come in and benefit?
Actually you'll find that Congress' relevant subcommittee decided it is a monopoly back in 2020. Things haven't gotten any better since.
That's an interesting read, but it's not much more than a list of accusations from bureaucrats. The true test of all of that will be in the courts.
Regarding Apple, they say that the company has monopoly power over iOS devices. That's like saying SpaceX has monopoly power over SpaceX rockets.
The old canard that “competition is efficient”. Like, what??
Competition is super wasteful.
That’s why mergers — that is, reducing competition — is always followed by layoffs — reducing redundancies increases efficiency (up to a point… usually to 4-5 competitors, then efficiency, depending on what you’re measuring… profit or price, goes up/down)
@Someone else
That's emphatically not why companies lay off employees after a merger. Are you a lobbyist by trade, perhaps?
@Old Unix Geek “when in Rome it is polite to do as a Roman.”
Reality of consumer electronics is for regular consumers doesn’t matter which system they use. They don’t understand it nor care anyway. Except for the number of cameras, alleged “speed” of the “cpu” and color painting of the case perhaps. Per se this is a tragedy already with important implications for the environment. For more technically inclined people is much more complicated but I beg to disagree vertical integration lead to a much better, albeit humanely imperfect, experience than with Android. Or with Rome for who knows how it really is to live in the Eternal City. Let’s also not forget the hideous Google stranglehold on anything privacy preserving. What users want to endure while in that side of the market used to amaze me.
For me the EU, who pushed the equivalent of a SCART connector on smartphones letting the populace believe it will fix “sustainability” issues, should not be trying to pry open a platform while using Google’s Android as a blueprint. Minimum common denominator. If consumers want Android it is available for purchase already. For as low as a handful of euros. Twenty percent, on average, of europeans choose otherwise. How is this not a “free” market already. Choice between two. Easy. Rome or Zurich.
Of course EMPs may just prefer a free flow data harvesting, inferior solutions they can directly tap in to. But are not telling.
Nah, it's fine. Interoperability is neither a threat nor intrinsically going to result in an inferior experience—that's just silly fearmongering. More likely is that regulators will make performative—and often poor—choices because the monopolists won't do the decent thing and move on their own. Which is a real shame, and highlights the essentially top-down nature of political deal-making, but is still infinitely preferable to cosy capitalism for the few and miserable concessions for the rest, even when the notional experience is better when you have nowhere else to go, in the short-medium term. That's just not healthy and there's no room for things to improve when so much power is vested in so few hands.