Apple has lost its legal battle over a €13 billion ($14.4 billion) Irish tax bill and Google has lost its legal battle over a €2.4 billion ($2.7 billion) fine for abusing market power, in a double blow to a tough EU crackdown on big tech companies.
Today, the Court of Justice of the European Union in Luxembourg upheld a landmark 2016 ruling that Ireland had violated state aid law by giving an unfair advantage to Apple.
In another victory for EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager, the same court ruled that Google had illegally exploited its search engine dominance to rank its own product listings higher.
Vestager – who will leave the European Commission a few months later after two terms – made Apple and Google major targets after taking office in 2014.
Apple’s conviction was the largest in its decade-long campaign for tax justice, which also targeted Amazon and automaker Stellantis NV Fiat.
Vestager considers the selective tax advantages granted to large companies to be illegal state aid and prohibited in the European Union.
Apple CEO Tim Cook previously criticized the European Union’s 2016 decision to order the company to pay €13 billion in back taxes as “complete political nonsense,” while the Commission fined Google in 2017 for abusing its dominant position on Google. Search to rank their own product listings higher.
Commenting on the European decision, an Apple spokesperson said: “We are disappointed with today’s decision, as the Court has previously considered the facts and categorically dismissed this case.”
As a result, Apple shares fell 1.3 percent to $218 in premarket trading Tuesday.
For its part, a Google spokesperson said the company was “disappointed” by the court’s decision on its appeal and that its 2017 offer to address EU concerns had helped create more obstacles for other shopping services.
The EU’s focus on Google paved the way for global surveillance, from the US to the UK. The EU wasn’t just targeting the company’s dominance in search, its shopping case was the first in a trilogy of fines that have resulted in sanctions totalling more than €8 billion.
EU competition watchdogs hope Silicon Valley’s behaviour will be reformed once and for all under sweeping new regulations that came into force last year through the Digital Markets Act.