Apple on Thursday lost a London lawsuit accusing the U.S. tech company of abusing its dominant position by charging app developers an unfair 30% commission through its app store.
The Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT) ruled against Apple after a trial of the lawsuit, brought on behalf of around 20 million iPhone and iPad users in the United Kingdom and valued at up to 1.5 billion pounds ($2.01 billion), earlier this year.
Rachael Kent, the British academic who brought the case, argued Apple had made “exorbitant profits” by excluding all competition for the distribution of apps and in-app purchases.
The CAT ruled that Apple had abused its dominant position by shutting out competition in the app distribution market and by “charging excessive and unfair prices in the form of the commission