Germany, France and the Netherlands have complained that the EU is not tough enough on Big Tech and called on regulators to make it harder for the likes of Google and Facebook to pursue killer acquisitions.
A paper signed by Bruno Le Maire, France’s finance minister, Peter Altmaier, Germany’s minister for economic affairs, and Mona Keijzer, the Dutch economic affairs minister, said the EU’s flagship proposals for future technology regulation, the Digital Markets Act, lacked “ambition”.
The paper, which has yet to be published, but which has been seen by the Financial Times, called for the EU to strengthen and “speed up” merger scrutiny, particularly when it comes “to strategies of platform companies consisting in systematically buying up nascent companies in order to stifle competition”.
The countries also called on the European Commission to hand them more power to legislate and enforce tech policy at a country level, just days after Germany opened antitrust cases against both Amazon and Google.
They called for a “swift and proactive co-operation” between EU countries and Brussels and a widening of the legal scope for member states to act locally.
As the Digital Markets Act passes through the European parliament, the countries want to see “clear and legally certain” thresholds for mergers and acquisitions, which would force scrutiny of takeovers by Big Tech companies where their targets have little revenue but potentially valuable technology.
Tech companies have a record of acquiring potential competitors at an early stage, such as Facebook’s purchase of both WhatsApp and Instagram when they were relatively small.
“Effectiveness lies in the combination of measures for all gatekeepers and a flexible approach on a case-by-case basis by taking targeted action against the very largest players. This includes our efforts to prevent them from buying up innovative start-ups on a regular basis. That is why we want all mergers and acquisitions by gatekeepers to be assessed by the regulator,” said Keijzer.
A push from member states to have more say on how to curb the power of Big Tech as Brussels seeks to enact EU-wide rules and take a leading role has worried EU officials.
At the start of the year, Margrethe Vestager, the EU’s competition chief, warned in an interview with the FT that it was in the interest of the large platforms to align with Brussels with one single legislation or face a patchwork of national rules.
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May 27, 2021 at 11:00AM
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EU is too soft on Big Tech, say France, Germany and the Netherlands - Financial Times
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