Japan’s Fair Trade Commission begins to investigate whether Google and Apple have abused their dominant position in the market

Earlier, the US and South Korean antitrust regulators and government agencies investigated Google and Apple. The main question was whether Google and Apple violated regulations.

However, solving the problems in the Korean market is not the end for Google and Apple, because now Japanese antitrust regulators are also investigating whether there are violations.

Japan’s Fair Trade Commission has begun a preliminary investigation of the relevant situation in the Japanese smartphone market, and of course, the targets of the investigation are Google and Apple.

“Playing with tablets #android #ios #ipad” by Olivier Anh is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

At the same time, the committee will also cooperate with the Japan Digital Market Competition Commission and is currently preparing a report on the market results.

The current investigation mainly involves operating system developers, application developers, and terminal device users. The opinions of different market entities are collected and summarized.

Although this investigation is mainly for smartphones, the Japanese Fair Trade Commission will also explore the market for smartwatches and other wearable devices.

Through the above investigation, the committee hopes to compile a list of items that are anti-competitive and report which items or behaviors are in violation of relevant Japanese laws.

The ultimate goal is naturally to investigate whether Apple and Google use the market advantages of their operating systems to monopolize the application market and put consumers at a disadvantage.

Via: Nikkei Asia