What you need to know
- Microsoft's President has slammed the App Store's rules.
- Brad Smith says the marketplace is a far higher barrier to competition than Windows was in the 90s.
- He was speaking to the House Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee a few weeks ago.
Microsoft President Brad Smith has told the House of Representatives that regulators should take a closer look at Apple's App Store rules, which he says are much more restrictive than Windows was in the late 90s.
Microsoft Corp. President Brad Smith raised concerns to U.S. lawmakers about what the company regards as Apple Inc.'s anti-competitive behavior around its app store, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Also the company's chief legal officer, Smith was reportedly invited to the committee a number of weeks ago to discuss Microsoft's antitrust battle with the government in the 90s. According to the report, he also discussed "the company's issue with Apple" during the conversation.
He is said to have told the committee that they should examine the App Store's rules:
Smith said last month that regulators should examine app store rules, which he called a far higher barrier to fair competition than Microsoft's Windows operating software when it was found guilty of antitrust violations 20 years ago. While Smith didn't name Apple in that public interview, a Microsoft spokesperson said later the executive was referring to the iPhone maker.
Tim Cook will testify alongside the CEOs of Amazon, Facebook, and Google next week to the same committee on this matter. The EU has also launched investigations into Apple Pay and the App Store over concerns about anticompetitive practices. Apple responded stating the move was "disappointing", and that the complaints were "baseless".
