Reversing course, Apple approves Epic Games’ iOS game store – SiliconANGLE

Apple Inc. today gave Epic Games Inc. the go-ahead to make its video game marketplace available for iOS users in the European Union. 

The decision comes hours after Epic accused the iPhone maker of rejecting the app. In conjunction, Epic announced plans to share its concerns about the matter with the European Commission, the European Union’s executive arm. Last month, the EU tentatively found that Apple had breached the bloc’s competition rules with its app distribution rules.

Epic’s video game marketplace gives iOS users access to the company’s collection of mobile titles. That includes the iPhone version of Fortnite, Epic’s flagship game. Fortnite boasts more than 600 million users and is estimated to have generated more than $2 million in daily revenue at one point.

According to Epic, Apple rejected two requests to make its game marketplace available on the iPhone and iPad. The reason is that Apple found parts of the marketplace to be too similar to the App Store’s interface. In particular, Apple took issue with an “Install” button and a label that reads “In-app purchases.”

The iPhone maker said in a statement earlier today that it was working with Epic to make the app ready for launch. According to Apple, the video game developer had signed a contract stating that it won’t make its apps overly similar to the App Store. 

Epic Games, for its part, stated that “Apple’s rejection is arbitrary, obstructive, and in violation of the DMA, and we’ve shared our concerns with the European Commission.”

The DMA is a piece of EU legislation that went into effect in March. It requires Apple to support third-party app marketplaces that compete with the App Store. Last month, the European Commission tentatively concluded that Apple had breached this requirement.

EU officials’ concerns center on a fee that the iPhone maker applies to apps downloaded through third-party marketplaces. The Core Technology Fee, as it’s known, amounts to €0.50 per app installation. The EU believes that some of Apple’s other rules for third-party app stores may also be breaching the DMA.

The iPhone maker’s terms of service for in-app purchases have drawn scrutiny as well. Apple provides a payment processing system for iOS developers. In 2020, Epic Games updated the iOS version of its flagship Fortnite game to use a third-party payment processing system, which prompted Apple to remove it from the App Store.

The move kicked off a years-long legal dispute that eventually reached the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Last year, the court issued a decision that accepted most of Apple’s arguments. However, the judges ruled that the company must let developers such as Epic include a link to third-party payment platforms in their apps. 

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