Microsoft and Google Under Scanner For Clubbing AI with office suite in India!

 Financial Express, here. 

Crafting the Regulatory Ecosystem for AI: Competition 2.0

 N. Cunha Rogrigues, here. 

Goals of the AfCFTA Competition Protocol Digital Market Competition Regulations: Lessons from South Africa’s Online Intermediation Platform Market Inquiry (OIPMI), the EU’s DMA and the US Experiences with Digital Platform Giants

V. Kedogo Kigwiru and Z. Georgieva, here.

“One Year After the Draghi Report" Keynote address by Professor Mario DRAGHI

 Video here.

Draghi's speech here. 

Von der Leyen's speech here.

Remarks at 2025 Anti-Monopoly Summit

 L. Khan, here. 

Video of the Summit, day 1 here.

Künstliche Intelligenz als soziotechnische Entwicklung

 H. Ruschemeier, hier.

Penske v. Google

 Here.

How to Build a Post-American Liberal Order

P. O'Brien, here.  

International Competition Law: My Syllabus, Unbound

 Course Description

Competition policy has long been regarded as an essential framework for any economy based on market exchange. Its logic is not confined to capitalist systems; rather, it establishes the conditions under which markets can function at all. Traces of such principles can already be discerned in the Roman world two millennia ago, anticipating many features of modern regimes. In recent years, competition has also been valued as a mechanism for stimulating innovation across a wide range of fields, extending far beyond its important role in driving price rivalry.

Unlike other areas of law, there has never been a codified body of international competition law. Yet practice has always carried a strong cross-border dimension. The case of Google in Europe is emblematic: multiple abuses of a dominant position by a U.S. company not only harmed European consumers but also affected European firms, as well as other companies operating within the EU. Many of the latter were themselves U.S. firms.

Traditionally, transatlantic cooperation between the European Union and the United States provided an anchor for international enforcement. These two jurisdictions have also been at the origin of several international initiatives in the field, most notably the creation and promotion of the International Competition Network. The OECD, though a more limited “club” of states, has likewise played an influential role in shaping cross-jurisdictional competition policy.

In recent months, however, the pace of history has accelerated. Established alliances have weakened, autocracies have flourished, and new partnerships among democratic blocs are bound to shape global competition policy in novel ways.

This course begins with a brief historical excursus before moving swiftly to the current order. The beginning of modern legislation in the field of competition policy is usually identified with the enactment of the Sherman Act in the United States in 1890, often regarded as the foundational statement of modern antitrust principles. These principles directly influenced the provisions of the Treaty of Rome, which founded the European Economic Community in the late 1950s. Competition was enshrined there into core legal provisions, as it was seen as an important tool to achieve the European single market—a pivotal project, all of which was to be based firmly on the rule of law.

In the closing decades of the twentieth century, competition policy spread widely, with antitrust legislation being adopted in almost every jurisdiction, including China. Yet rather than being strengthened, it often lost force under the prevailing neoliberal ideology. That system rested on a stylised belief that markets tended to function well on their own, requiring only minimal intervention in cases of market failure. The result was a competition policy that became hesitant, overly cautious, and in many respects ineffective.

Today, however, we are entering a post-neoliberal phase. This shift poses new challenges for competition policy, which must be re-imagined and made more effective in order to confront the multiplication of monopolies, particularly in key sectors such as digital technologies and global platforms.

The course will adopt a pragmatic, case-based approach, relying on inductive reasoning rather than abstract theory. From the outset, students will be actively engaged with leading cases and encouraged to draw broader lessons from them. Class sessions will provide ample opportunity for discussion and group work. The material provided will focus on case analysis and critical reflection, always with an eye to the broader context of profound change. What has been done in the past may prove of limited use for the future, and it is precisely this transition that the course aims to address.

Learning Outcomes

By the end of the course, students will be able to:

• Understand what competition policy is and how it is designed to shape the functioning of a market economy.
• Recognise how the principles of competition policy are being transformed in light of the digital economy, the growing role of data as a source of value, and the rise of AI.
• Apply these principles to future-oriented scenarios, whether from the perspective of a business, a policy-making role, or a consultancy context.
• Use competition policy concepts in a strategic way, linking theory to practical challenges.
• Identify avenues for further study and research in competition law and policy.
•  

Assessment

Active participation is both mandatory and strongly encouraged, as it forms an integral part of the final grade. Students will be expected to contribute through presentations and small group assignments conducted throughout the course.

The final examination will be written ("paper and pen") and divided into two parts:

• a theoretical section with three open-ended questions;
• a case-based section, consisting of one question relating to a case discussed during the course.

Course Materials and Weekly Assignments

There is no single textbook for this course. Instead, students will receive weekly assignments consisting of readings and case materials. Each class session will build directly on this material, which together forms the required study corpus for the final exam. Weekly study and active participation are therefore not only encouraged but are in themselves the most effective preparation for the assessment.

Frequently Asked Questions: Data Act

 EC, here.

Dynamic Effects in Merger Control

 I. Lianos et al., here. 

Essence of "America First Antitrust"? Lobbyists directly replacing conflicted economists,

 Chez Cristina, here.

OMI Urges Court to Require Google Divestitures in Ad Tech Monopoly Case

 Here.

Interplay between the DSA and the GDPR: EDPB adopts guidelines

 Here.

Authors Guild, American Publishers Assn. CEOs listened to Judge Alsup’s scrutiny of their roles at settlement hearing in Bartz case. Then issued statements afterwards.

 Here. 

Cambio de reglas: la Data Act entra en juego para democratizar el mercado de los datos

 CincoDiás, aquì. 

European Data Union Strategy: how to write a new rulebook for Europe's digital values

 Video here.

Commission accepts commitments offered by Microsoft to address competition concerns related to Teams

 Here.

And Microsoft? Relieved, here.

Was der EU-Data-Act für Start-ups bedeutet

 Handelsblatt, hier. 

The Dwindling Law in Article 102 TFEU

 F. Castillo de la Torre, here.

Bridge Blueprint: Datenschützer stellen neues Papier vor

Hier.

Investment and competition over the business lifecycle

 CMA, here. 

Epic Games, Inc v Apple Inc [2025] FCA 900

 AU Federal Court, here. 

Google scraps some cloud data transfer fees in EU and UK

 Reuters, here. 

Strategic Foresight Report 2025

 EC, here. 

Digital Sovereignty Requires More Than Just European Tech

E. Bendinelli, here.  

Judge Alsup Blasts $1.5 Billion Anthropic AI Copyright Settlement (2)

 Bloomberg Law, here. 

[The Judge who learned how to code - Oracle v. Google]

Digital Markets Act Data related obligations sub-group to the High-Level Group for the Digital Markets Act

 5th Meeting, Minutes here. 

Google can’t have it both ways.

 SearchEngineLand, here.

PUBMATIC SUES GOOGLE OVER DIGITAL ADVERTISING MONOPOLY

 PubMatic, here.

Complaint here.

Google admits the open web is in ‘rapid decline’

 The Verge, here.

AI surveillance should be banned while there is still time.

 DuckDuckGo, here.

Ideas Have Consequences: The Impact of Law and Economics on American Justice

 E. Ash et al., here. 

A Judge Just Decided to Let Google Keep Breaking the Law

 J. Newman, here. 

Getting ready for the teaching semester: first slide (International Competition Policy Course)

 

Why Google Got Off Easy

 J. Kanter, here. 

¿Dónde está Teresa Ribera?

 Euractiv, here. 

PLAINTIFFS’ PROPOSED FINAL JUDGMENT, GOOGLE ADTECH

 Here.

Gatekeeper Data Portability APIs: Few Good, Tons of Bad and Ugly

 Code Policy, here.

Our founding Treaties, our laws and our core values are not up for debate

T. Ribera, here. 

Press Release, here.  

The problem of monopoly': Why Google's light anti-trust penalties could pose a dilemma for Canada

 Financial Post, here. 

War, trade, and antitrust

Bruegel Annual Meetings | 3-4 September 2025, 

Video here. 

Mario Monti said that Teresa Ribera should've considered resigning after what happened on Monday. On Friday, coup de théâtre: big fine and possible structural remedies. What happened really during this rather defining week for the EU? 

The Limits of Antitrust Remedies in the Google Search Case

 M. MacCarthy, here.

AI Act Guide

 NL Gov, here.

Chez Oles, discussing Art. 5(2) DMA

 

Video here. 

Tech CEOs Take Turns Praising Trump at White House Dinner

 WSJ, here. 

Also here.

Wall Street, Google, and Trump's DOJ celebrating

 Here.

Surrender a pair of shoes today and who knows what you are going to give up tomorrow?

 FT, here.

Big Tech’s political power has been channelled through the market. By now, we shoud've learned our lesson. AI technologies imposed on consumers and business users are new forms of intermediation. Left to well known dynamics, enshittification is inevitable. US citizens and consumers have no choice, but is it what we want for the EU? Again? 

AI quietly mediates our world

 BBC, here.

New cloud and AI development Act

 Public submissions, here.

EU's pace is utterly inadequate, in these changing times. What to do? 

Contested Ground: Early Competition and Market Dynamics in Generative AI

 CRAI, here.

No need to worry, everything's just fine. Ask Big Tech and AI conflicted economists! 

Luckily, these "studies" are increasingly getting the attention they deserve. 

National Development and Reform Commission's August press conference

 Transcript here.

Mexico's neoliberal period over - and competition enforcement strengthened?

GCR, here.

A real commitment to economic populism require a willingness to make rich and powerful people upset, right?”

 UnHerd, with L. Khan, here.

Google set to face modest EU antitrust fine in adtech investigation, sources say

 Reuters, here.

The crawl-to-click gap: Cloudflare data on AI bots, training, and referrals

 The Cloudfare Blog, here.

Assistant Attorney General Gail Slater Delivers Remarks to the Ohio State University Law School

 Speech here.

Waiting for Judge Mehta's remedies...

Lina Khan recently reminded us that antitrust is “pro-growth” because it clears away private choke points. Europe has written that logic into law through the DMA; the US still waits on individual judges to prise open markets. Mehta’s decision (from here, at some point) will tell us whether American enforcement can rise to the challenge—or whether the choke points will remain firmly in place, and further expand into the gatekeepers AI age. 

Inside the Lobbying Blitz Over Colorado's AI Law

 TPP, here.

Google kneecaps indie Android devs, forces them to register

 The Register, here.

Anthropic users face a new choice – opt out or share your chats for AI training

 TechCrunch, here.

EuroStack: Enough Contemplation, but also Enough Straw Mannerism

 The Eurostack, here.

[Interestingly, straw mannerism has been the preferred tactic also against DMA supporters - plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose]

BREAKING UP WITH BIG TECH

 Amnesty International, here.

EU speed-learning how to bull-fight with Trump?

T. Ribera, here. 

T. Breton, here and here. 

And, finally, H. Virkkunen, here (on her favourite social network).

Lina Khan: “You can only undo so much in three and a half years”

 Newstatesman, here., 

Authors celebrate “historic” settlement coming soon in Anthropic class action

 ArsTechnica, here.

Additional AI questionnaire to the first DMA review

Here. 

About the DMA Review and the first submission see here and here.

Brazil judge grants injunction against soy moratorium suspension

 Reuters, here.

President Trump is kindly invited to our DMA Conference. Thank you.

Mr President,

Perhaps it is all a misunderstanding. Our EU laws are not meant to punish your most prized tech companies, but to secure contestability and fairness in European digital markets. In your own language, it is about levelling the playing field, making markets great again, and ensuring that everyone gets, as you would put it, a fair deal.

In the spirit of cultivating a more balanced understanding in our transatlantic intercourse, we would be delighted to welcome you to our forthcoming conference on the Digital Markets Act, in person or online. There you will hear from independent researchers—a species now sadly endangered in the United States—that the DMA is not contrived to screw your crown jewels, but to build European digital markets on principles rather different from those across the Atlantic, namely firmly rooted in contestability and fairness.

For years we in Europe played the dutiful vassal, scarcely noticing the role, nodding along while our digital industries were subdued and our consumers cheerfully milked. Only recently, as one of our leading thinkers put it, has our faith in this US promoted version of neoliberalism been broken—and here too, Mr President, your role was not negligible. We now see our dependencies and chains—bound to technologies devised elsewhere, with embedded values ofter far from our own.

Thank you for your kind attention. We look forward to your prompt feedback.

Kindest regards

Elon Musk’s xAI Sues Apple and OpenAI, Alleging They Are ‘Monopolists’

 WSJ, here. Here.

Draghi's Rimini Speech: Game Over for Europe?

 Here. Video here.

It seems that the antitrust authorities now find themselves caught between hammer and anvil. On the one side, their governments may bow to Trump’s policy line, dismantling digital ex-ante legislation in the process. The clearest cases are South Korea and, quite possibly, India. On the other side comes Draghi, declaring the world order over—with obvious consequences for the international role of independent competition authorities which were established as part of the neoliberal package. Truly, interesting times lie ahead. The EU "adapted" to that age too, as Draghi reminded us (more economic approach, anyone?), but it needs to change again. Quickly. 

Zur Abhängigkeit deutscher Unternehmen von den Clouddiensten ausländischer Anbieter

 Bundesregierung, hier.

Urteil: Landgericht untersagt Google Gmail-Bevorzugung bei Android-Einrichtung

 Heise.de, hier. 

BRIEF FOR THE AMERICAN ANTITRUST INSTITUTE AS AMICUS IN SUPPORT OF EPIC

 Here.

Why Countries Must Fight For Digital Sovereignty

 C. Rikap, here.

Digitale Ohnmacht – Deutschland im Bann von Big Tech

 ARD, hier.

Springer-Chef Döpfner: Heikle Nähe zu Musk, Zuckerberg & Co

 ARD, hier.

Meta urged to ban child-like chatbots amid Brazil’s safety concerns

 DigWatch, here. 

Judge says Amazon must disclose its research funding to economists, academics and think tanks as part of a class action lawsuit.

Motion to compel, here.

Order granting motion to compel, here.

This is Lina Khan's article BTW, from Wavesblog archives.

[What about an academic who writes an economic paper "recommending caution" from enforcers - exculpating Amazon's self-preferencing - and a few days after publication starts working for Amazon. Does it count as external or internal? 

More fundamentally: does this type of intellectual capture work like this? Amazon supplies data (and money), friendly IO economists in academia supply theories - models, and the outcomes neatly reinforce the economics that defend entrenched power? Huge ROI possible.

[Possibly, however, the real problem of  this type economics is that it's used by Big Tech as a distraction. [Spend precious time debating models - like Romans were doing over entrails? - instead of devoting time and efforts observing and trying to understand the complexities of the technological world and their societal implications. Clearly, we'd need a different type of social science for that]].

What happened?

 

Google updates terms for app marketplace following EU pressure

 

Euronews, here. 

Virtual (ASCOLA) Townhouse Meeting With Lina Khan

  September 4, 10-11 am Eastern Time, here to sign up. 

No abuse of dominant position by Meta, per NCA in Argentina

 Aquì. 

Experts React to Reuters Reports on Meta's AI Chatbot Policies

 TechPolicyPress, here.

AI openness: A primer for policymakers

 OECD, here.

The power of (the request of) interim measures? Players free to participate in the DIHL competition

 Belgian competition authority, here.

Court decides "Pay or Okay" on DerStandard.at is illegal

 noyb, here.

Now anyone can pay for a Substack subscription in iOS

 On Substack, here.

The Weaponized World Economy

 H. Farrell, A. Newman, here.

How Open is today’s “Open Web”?

 Developes Alliance, podcast here.

AI IS A MASS-DELUSION EVENT

 C. Warzel, here.

The Rule of Law Versus the Rule of Lobbyists

 R. Alford, here.

Videos here.

Not a systemic problem, bur rather a personnel problem that can be fixed - he says. We also heard only four months ago how Trump II Antitrust was going to be wonderful, here. Allow me a grain of scepticism. 

Google admits anti-competitive conduct involving Google Search in Australia

 ACCC, here.

Should Europe wean itself off US tech?

BBC, here.

FTC to suspend push to regulate US platform firms amid trade risk

 The Korea Times, here.

Meta’s AI rules have let bots hold ‘sensual’ chats with kids, offer false medical info

 Reuters, here.

The New AI Data Trade, Part 1: Cashing In on AI

 WSJ, podcast here.

From Robber Barons to Bezos: Is History Repeating Itself?

 R. Reich, Video here. 

Chat Templates

 Asimov's Addendum, here. 

Rechtbank Amsterdam, and the DMA

 Hier and here.

What do we need? An EuroSweeney!

 

Consciously Uncoupling from Silicon Valley w/ Cori Crider

The Maybe, Podcast  here.

BRAZILIAN ANTITRUST REGULATOR LAUNCHES INVESTIGATION AGAINST MICROSOFT OVER OPERA ACCUSATIONS

 Bricscompetition, here.

India’s Digital Competition Bill: Innovation, Regulation & Global Lessons

 ASCOLA India, here.

Cecilia Rikap: »Wir alle produzieren KI, aber nur einige Wenige profitieren«

 C.Rikap, here.

The head of ChatGPT on AI attachment, ads, and what’s next

 Decoder, here.

Google pushes AI into flight deals as antitrust scrutiny, competition heat up

TechCrunch, here. 

Google ‘Shell Game’ Shields Executive Lobbying from Public View

 TPP, here. 

Letter to DOJ: Break Google’s Ad Tech Monopoly and Request Restitution to News Publishers for Lost Revenue

 Center for Journalism and Liberty, here.

Call for Submissions: Digital Competition Conference 2026

 KGI, here. 

Statement on Revocation of Biden-Harris Executive Order on Competition

 DOJ Antitrust Division, here.

And so ends one of the most interesting experiments of Biden-era antitrust, that had begun delivering tangible results for the very American people whom Trump never misses a chance to screw over. 

Jonathan Kanter on Perplexity’s bid for Chrome, Musk’s threats against Apple and Trump’s export tax

 CNBC, here.

No, The Tunney Act Won’t Save Democracy

 D. Bush, here. 

An Indian undertaking filed an antitrust case against Google 15 y. ago and the case is still ongoing

 From this interesting India ASCOLA webinar, hopefully recording available soon. Why was their DMA "frozen"? 

The Limits and Promise of Global Antitrust Law

 A. Bradford, A. Chilton, and K. Linos, here. 

Weaponizing Antitrust and Regulation Will Hurt US Consumers

 D. Moss, here. 

Jorge Padilla: Economics of Competition Policy | Competition Litigation as a Chessboard | Hard Cases

 Chez Oles, here. 

OLG Schleswig-Holstein: Antrag auf Erlass einer einstweiligen Verfügung gegen Meta wegen Verwendung von Nutzerdaten als KI-Trainingsdaten mangels Dringlichkeit abgelehnt

 Beckmann und Norda, hier. 

Perplexity Makes Longshot $34.5 Billion Offer for Chrome

 WSJ, here. 

Japan’s largest newspaper, Yomiuri Shimbun, sues AI startup Perplexity for copyright violations

 NiemanLab, here. 

Epic wins cases against Apple and Google in Australia

 Gtlaw, here. 

An AI Replay of the Browser Wars, Bankrolled by Google

 Bloomberg, here.

How AI-Driven Search May Reshape Democracy, Economics, and Human Agency

 C. Pattison et al., here.

Businesses can use your online data to overcharge you. What can customers do?

 NPR, here.

Wie energisch greift die EU gegen Big Tech durch?

 ARD, Tagesschau hier.

The proposed ex-ante regime downgraded to a market study in India: Big Win for Big Tech

 FE, here.

That was soon after South Korea's decision to dump its DMA too. Big Tech in Asia is likely celebrating, with Trump's support. By the way, how effective and influential are independent civil society orgs and academics in those jurisdictions? 

More post-mortem (of the Draft Digital Competition Bill) next 13 August, 14.30 CET here. 

Emerging Antitrust Implications for "Fact Checking” Content

 PerkinsCoie, here.

AI Compute Sovereignty: Infrastructure Control Across Territories, Cloud Providers, and Accelerators

 Z. Hawkins, here.

9 ways DuckDuckGo's Search Assist Differs from Google’s AI Overviews

 DuckDuckGo, here.

Apple’s lock on iPhone browser engines gets a December deadline

 The Verge, here.

Should UK private competition enforcement be dismantled as well?

 UK Gov, here.

Reminder: a Labour Government. 

Japan: Apple Must Lift Browser Engine Ban by December

 OWA, here.

Thousands of hotels in Europe to sue Booking.com over ‘abusive’ practices

 The Guardian, here. 

Yep, agreed - since 2016 here. 

Opinion: McGrath must take on giants of social media

 J. Ryan, here. 

‘I Feel Like I’m Going Crazy’: ChatGPT Fuels Delusional Spirals

 WSJ, here. 

Building Public Compute for the Age of AI

 Lawfare, here. 

Google vs. Perplexity fight plays out in India as AI battle intensifies

 RestofWorld, here. 

The Urgent Need For Revolutionizing Economic Statistics

 D. Coyle, here. 

["...if, in the not-too-distant future, my personal AI agent conducts affairs on my behalf with my bank’s AI bot, is that valuable economic activity? How should it be measured in any case?]

Cloud: "...competitors aren't able to do the competitive thing we like about capitalism"

DHH, here.

 

Re: Investigate Meta's de facto vertical acquisition of Scale AI

 

Here. 

Qwant and Ecosia debut Staan, a European search index that aims to take on Big Tech

 TechCrunch, here. 

noyb survey: only 7% of users want Meta to use their personal data for AI

 Here.

Digital Sovereignty and resisting the tech giants w/ Cecilia Rikap

Politics Theory Other, Podcast here.

How Big Cloud becomes Bigger: Scrutinizing Google, Microsoft, and Amazon's investments

D. Gray Widder, N. Kim, here.

See also here [if data correct: Google, Microsoft and Amazon investing *a lot* in the UK].

Russia Builds a New Web Around Kremlin’s Handpicked Super App

 MSN, here. 

Europe’s tech sovereignty watch

 Proton, here. 

"When a company chooses an email service, it often uses the entire suite." 

Take Back Our Digital Infrastructure To Save Democracy

 TechDirt, here. 

From Millions To Billions — Johannes Ernst — FediCon 2025

 Video here. 

Meta's vision: Shimmering Shades of a Cage?

 Run Data Run, here. 

OpenAI's GPT-OSS

 Run Data Run, here. 

How Brazil's innovative 'Pix' payment system is angering Trump and Zuckerberg

 France24.com, here.

Totally disagree with the myopic economist's comment 😊

OpenX v. Google

Here.

Curbing Google’s Dominance: The UK’s First Test of Its New Digital Competition Powers [Promising?]

 KGI, here.

Well...Problematic to say the least is "making its next steps contingent on the decisions of a US district court." 

Nextcloud-CEO: “Digitale Souveränität ist für mich nicht gelöst”

 Computerwoche.de, hier.

Submission on Proposed SMS Guideline from an Independent Media Alliance

 Here.

Japan: Regulator takes aim at app store - as in Europe.

Heise.de, here. 

Guidelines here.  

The Guidelines are essential reading. Not just from a European vantage point, and not merely as part of a deepening dialogue between the EU and Japan. It matters equally for jurisdictions already exploring DMA-like regimes, and for others now stirred into action.

From what I’ve seen so far, this may well be the first unmistakable success of the DMA’s extraterritorial footprint. A quiet vindication of the bold choices made by the Commission and co-legislators since 2020. No legal instrument is flawless, of course. But if others now refine what we’ve built into the DMA, there should be a clear and iterative path to integrate such improvements.

Ecosia, European Eco-Friendly Search Engine: Boosting Competition in Digital Area

"Chez Oles," here.

The conversation with Ecosia’s Wolfgang Oels was recorded at the height of the Trump/EU trade frenzy, when whispers of the DMA’s untimely demise were making the rounds. But rumours (spread by whom, I wonder) they were. If anything, things are only now starting to get serious 🤠. And gatekeepers' competitors like Ecosia have an important role to play as part of the DMA enforcement machinery.

Today, the "Commission reiterated that the bloc's flagship digital laws, specifically the DSA and the DMA, will not even be mentioned in an upcoming joint statement on the EU-US trade deal, expected to be published imminently," Euractiv here.

The Modern Economic Approach to Antitrust Law: Analysis and Examples

 S. Salop, here.

[I don't know what modern means, here. Very much the same "more economic approach" that has been increasingly repudiated for a number of compelling reasons - not least because of it being used to shamelessly - "it's science, we teach it our Students!" - justify whatever suits who pays the IO economists providing the analysis]. 

EU AI Act: What's Next?"

 Video here.

The Growing Complexity of Digital Economies over the GenAI Waterfall: Challenges and Policy Implications

 W. Lehr, V. Stocker, here.

Unpacking China's Global AI Governance Plan

 TechPolicyPress, Podcast here.

Private enforcement of competition law: a survey of preliminary references to the Court of Justice (2024–2025)

 M. Strand, here. 

What Open-Source Developers Need to Know about the EU AI Act's Rules for GPAI models

 Hugging Face, here.

Freigabe des Erwerbs der Kontrolle über Informatica durch Salesforce

 Bundeskartellamt, hier.

Sustainability agreement in the wine sector in Occitanie: opinion published

 EC, here.

[Great for next teaching semester, and for a Master student working on this topic]

Who owns the media?

 FreePress, here.

Democracy and Competition Law: Exploring Substantive and Procedural Links

 M. Bernatt, here.

China’s subsidies create, not destroy, value

 Asia Times, here.

Mergers, Innovation, and Sustainability: An EU Constitutional Perspective

 J.-U. Franck, here.

Lina Khan points to Figma IPO as vindication of M&A scrutiny

 TechCrunch, here.

Silicon Valley’s New Strategy: Move Slow and Build Things

 WSJ, here.

Epic Games v. Google: The Appeal

 Here.

See also FTC's Brief, here.

Installing marketplaces from the web: updated user experience in the EU

 Apple, here. 

Innovation or Infringement? Generative AI and the Potential for Exclusionary Abuse under Article 102 TFEU

 T. Davies, here. 

Olivier Guersent: Inside the EU’s Antitrust Machine and the Future of European Power

 Capitol Forum, here.

AI GOVERNANCE AND THE EU’S STRATEGIC ROLE IN 2025

 M. Cantero Gamito, here. 

Generative AI in Check: Gatekeeper Power and Policy Under the DMA

 A. Ribera Martinez, here. 

Zuckerberg: AI increased the time spent on Facebook and Instagram in Q2

 TechCrunch, here. 

Google loses app store antitrust appeal, must make sweeping changes to Play Store

 ArsTechnica, here. 

CLOUD SERVICES MARKET INVESTIGATION: FINAL CUT

CMA, Summary of final decision here. 

Full 637-page Report here. 

Appendix A-W here. 

This is already the new Bible on 'cloud services and competition policy.' This colossal work will feed into worldwide antitrust and DMA-like analyses and enforcement actions, both public and private, for years to come. 

But, you know, the "CMA has indicated that no decision will be taken by the CMA Board on future SMS designation investigations in 2025 but that it will keep under review possible options and it anticipates that these will be considered in early 2026"...

Italian authorities raid Meta over WhatsApp AI function

 Euractiv, here.

Did Meta Tie its AI Assistant to WhatsApp?

 T. Davies, here.

Meta Sudans Redux: AGCM at the Gates

Fresh off the press release: the Italian antitrust authority has knocked — quite literally — on Meta’s door. A dawn raid hit the company’s Italian offices yesterday. Perhaps it’s just a coincidence, but there’s been a notable uptick in enforcement on this side of the pond since that so-called 'windmills' trade deal struck on the golf course. 

The opening decision spans some fifteen pages, and it's apt to delight both the die-hard antitrust nerds and those somewhat disillusioned by competition law, who now see more promise in a concerted regulatory front combining multiple toolkits at once. As you Wavesblog Reader will have gathered by now, I firmly belong to the latter camp — and it’s from that vantage point that I’ll offer a few brief reflections on this decision.

For many of us in the latter camp, this 2014 Venn diagram from the European Data Protection Supervisor remains, to this day, a quietly persistent source of inspiration. The attentive Reader will have noticed that this diagram makes no mention of the Digital Markets Act (DMA)  — unsurprisingly, as it entered into force a full decade after the diagram first appeared. Nor does it include more recent hybrid instruments, such as Section 19a of the German Competition Act. I would place the DMA precisely at the intersection of those three circles — where data protection, competition, and consumer protection converge. Technically speaking, the DMA operationalises elements from each of these domains. From competition law, it borrows e.g. the focus on market power, albeit reinterpreted, and barriers to entry; from data protection, it incorporates core concepts such as consent, data minimization and the 'by design' principle; from consumer protection, it reflects concerns such as user  manipulation. But this is far from a flattening or plain subsuming of these established legal domains. Something original has emerged, a distinct regulatory logic. 

Back to the AGCM's decision. If you’re anything like me, you did everything you could to avoid clicking on the shimmering little button that popped up on your WhatsApp screen — but you couldn’t exactly miss it either. As the Italian authority put it, the "Meta AI service was made autonomously available to users without them having taken any action to that effect. In other words, Meta chose to pre-install Meta AI and place it in a prominent position on the screen, making the service immediately available to all its WhatsApp users.” While neither the icon nor the search bar can be removed by the user, the Italian authority explained that users could, if they wished, initiate an independent chat with other AI services—such as ChatGPT—by manually adding them as a contact. I tried it out immediately (ah, the things we do in the name of research: now I've ChatGPT sending me unrequested messages). And yet, the Meta AI icon stays firmly in place, as does the search bar, helpfully prompting: “Ask Meta AI or search."

The Italian authority then embarks on what can only be described as a Kafkaesque journey through Meta’s “policies.” At first, Meta appears to say they don’t use your interactions with Meta AI to train the model — and then, a few brave clicks later, they say they do. That is, except for private messages, unless you or someone in the chat chooses to share those private messages "with our AIs" too. And in any case, as the AGCM immediately notes, it was Meta itself that stated WhatsApp user interactions would be used to train and improve their models. But it doesn’t stop there. As the Italian antitrust authority points out, Meta’s Privacy Policy suggests that WhatsApp users may gradually receive a personalised version of the service — based on the information they themselves have provided to Meta. In other words, each interaction with Meta AI feeds the system with information, some of which is then used to deliver increasingly personalised outputs. The aim? As Meta puts it, to make the responses from Meta AI more “useful and relevant.”

Already at this point, there would be plenty to say from a data protection, consumer protection, and DMA perspective. But for now, let’s stick to plain antitrust logic — though, as we know, it’s never that plain, and at times not that logical. This is an investigation under Article 102 TFEU, aimed at determining whether there has been an abuse of dominant position. The focus is, in essence, on a potential case of leveraging market power from one market — where the company holds dominance — into another, adjacent but distinct, market where it does not. All of this is well covered by EU competition law precedents [I still remember a panel at ASCOLA 2018 NYU, chaired by Tim Wu, where the question was put to us panellists about what more antitrust law should be doing to tackle Big Tech. My answer then? Pay closer attention to these very forms of market leveraging]. And this, indeed, appears to be the core of the authority’s allegation: a classic case of tying by a dominant firm. Meta, it is argued, offers its main service - WhatsApp - together with a bundled, secondary service - Meta AI.  WhatsApp is an app designed for communication through advanced messaging technologies, while Meta AI is a separate service altogether — a generative AI tool meant to answer users’ general-purpose queries. Two distinct services. No question about it. But these aren’t just core platform services, as one might frame them under a DMA lens. From an antitrust perspective, they also correspond to distinct and separate markets.  When it comes to Meta’s dominance in the consumer communications market via app — whether at national or EU level — there is little room for reasonable doubt. The market definition and Meta’s entrenched position therein as sketched in the decision offer few revelations. More intriguing — and potentially more consequential — is the discussion around the market for AI chatbot or AI assistance services. The authority ventures into some possible delineations and goes on to consider potential competitors and their relative positions, but ultimately finds that, at this stage, the definition of the relevant markets for AI services can be left blissfully open (more on this later). With the question of market definition set aside, we reach what ought to be the real crux of the case: the identification of the alleged abuse. As previously indicated, the alleged abuse, according to the authority, lies in Meta tying two distinct services — WhatsApp and Meta AI — by pre-installing Meta AI within the WhatsApp app. Following the pre-installation, the AGCM argues, Meta — already in a dominant position with WhatsApp — would secure a competitive advantage in the market for AI chatbot or assistant services. The reason is straightforward: with minimal friction, WhatsApp’s more than 120 million users across Europe are instantly turned into potential users of Meta AI.

And here comes the discussion I personally find most compelling — not least for its broader implications. In paragraph 44, the authority goes a step further and notes that "it is also possible that Meta trains its AI model on the data and/or interactions with the user base of the service in which it holds a dominant position.” The authority thus argues that users are not only effectively *drawn* into using Meta AI through its pre-installation in the WhatsApp app — they also have their data and interactions used to train Meta’s AI model. These two intertwined dynamics may well produce exclusionary effects for rival providers of AI chatbot or assistant services, especially in light of the increased risk of user lock-in and functional dependency. In fact, argues the AGCM, Meta AI appears to store user-provided data over time — meaning its outputs become progressively more tailored and “relevant” as interaction increases, thereby reinforcing user reliance and raising the barriers for competitors.

This, dear Wavesblog Reader, is merely the opening decision. How it unfolds remains to be seen. But the heart of the matter seems clear enough: AI services offered by Big Tech — the very same platforms we use to chat with relatives, search online, or draft blog posts like this one, are being quietly shoved down our throats because they have already invested so much in AI. Not only are we given no meaningful choice as to whether we want to use these services — they come bundled, pre-installed, ready or not — but once we do, we effectively feed them. Our interactions are harvested to train their models as well as, in Meta AI's case, apparently, personalise and refine the AI’s responses, making them feel ever more “useful,” while subtly reinforcing our reliance. The endgame from a purely antitrust perspective? A state of lock-in and functional dependency that all but shuts the door to alternative providers. 

That said, one can’t help but notice once again how narrow this type of antitrust lens is. The current logic of Article 102 TFEU, with its insistence on delineating separate relevant markets, ends up artificially carving WhatsApp and Meta AI out of their broader context. And yet, we know we are dealing with Meta — a particularly intricate ecosystem, where the relationships between services and their intersections are structurally orchestrated through malleable code and the seamless flow of data across the platform’s various environments, and their combination with third-party 'tracking' data, all to fuel its gargantuan advertising machine. That this market-delineation logic is utterly inadequate and insufficient in dealing with Big Tech in particular is evidenced by the very existence of the DMA and Germany’s Section 19a competition law provision — both of which, rightly, go beyond it. 

One might well reply that Article 102 TFEU is no broad analytical lens for grasping the wider problems posed by this kind of economic power, let alone its slide into political influence. It is a sophisticated scalpel, not designed for sweeping diagnoses, but reliable and technically sound when used with skill and precision. And that, it seems, is how the Italian competition authority intends to wield it. The goal is to preserve competition in the emerging market for 'Her's like' personal AI assistants, which the authority sees taking shape as a distinct category of digital services (and related 'market') fuelled by generative AI. The protagonist of that uncannily prescient film falls hopelessly in love with his AI assistant — and that is the stickiest of 'lock-in' and 'functional dependency' scenarios for consumers more generally. It’s precisely what keeps him from even contemplating alternative AI companions, even when given the choice. One can easily imagine him letting her book his table at that little trattoria in Turin [where he went to visit the amazing Egyptian and Cinéma Museums] that perfectly matches his taste: all about tradition and authenticity, but with just the right touch of modern flair — because she knows him. Intimately. However, don't expect, dear Wavesblog Reader, to find any mention of Her in the AGCM’s opening decision. Had it been penned by one of those US judges with a flair for pop references, you might have found one. What that judge wouldn't have ignored, possibly, is that Her was not just an artistically brilliant film. It was a warning — painted in shades of pink and (S)carlet(t)-red — of a dystopian future.

And so we circle back to where we began: the 2014 EDPS Venn diagram - as 'updated'  to include the DMA. It’s clear the Italian antitrust authority knows it’s not operating in a vacuum. It is, rather, doing what it can with the tools at its disposal, under no optimistic assumption that the practices Meta engages in, and the services it rolls out, are otherwise fully compliant with the complementarily applicable legal regimes (those on the updated diagram and, additionally and eventually - as of tomorrow - the AI Act). Already the brief encounter with Meta’s privacy policy, as recounted in the decision, must have been enough to dispel any such illusion. 

Set against our diagram, the potential concern the AGCM has chosen to investigate, albeit subject to the still inadequate pace of traditional antitrust proceedings [but what about interim measures - do we really need to go to the Autorité for them?], is clearly narrow - as noted above - but also hardly open to serious dispute. With a mere system update, millions of WhatsApp users — without having asked for it — suddenly found themselves turned into potential Meta AI users, with a rollout laced with unmistakable nudges towards engagement. All this in a context where no one had prevented Meta’s prior appropriation of Facebook and Instagram users’ data to train its AI models (but, rest reassured, data protection authorities are still discussing whether this was ok or not). Also from the point of view of the DMA, that move was at least questionable. Now, let’s assume for a moment that there truly is an exclusionary effect — that rival “Hers” can’t quite compete on the merits with 'Meta AI the friendly assistant,' simply because they have access to far less data, not only generally to train AI models, also about individually about us as users and consumers. Is that something we should worry about? On one level, certainly yes. That attempts are being made to prevent this through the all-too-familiar tactic of leveraging power from one market into another, something we’ve seen Big Tech pull off more times than we care/dare to count without ever feeling the slightest constraint from antitrust law, is not only legitimate, it’s more than welcome. At the same time, we’re no longer in 2018 — when, responding to a thoughtful question from Tim Wu at NYU, I timidly suggested we'd need much more of exactly this kind of antitrust enforcement. Seven years later, I would now respond to the question of how one might rein in the power of Big Tech in a more articulated manner (I had also replied to Tim Wu that we ought to adopt a more technological approach — which, fortunately, has partly been done; as for the third point I raised at the time, I can’t honestly recall it now). In my view, even in newish markets such as that of AI assistants, we cannot afford to rely solely on the antitrust toolbox — we must instead firmly integrate it into an ex ante approach. This is also about avoiding being once again dazzled by what is marketed as the latest marvellous innovation, handed down and imposed without ever having been meaningfully checked, selected and chosen over a range of alternatives — including business models not grounded in surveillance and manipulation. 

 

The ongoing DMA offers a valuable opportunity to quickly respond to this and other challenges posed by Big Tech, in a context in which much attention is increasingly being devoted to the urgency of increased digital sovereignty for the EU (and everyone else outside of the US - and China): what can be activated immediately, perhaps with additional resources given to the Commission as the sole DMA enforcer, and where do genuine regulatory gaps remain that require prompt and determined action? For instance, could the risk of lock-in and functional dependency identified by the Italian antitrust authority be significantly mitigated if users enjoyed a right to data portability across AI assistants? Would a designation of Meta AI as incipient gatekeeper be immediately helpful? Among the other ex ante rules that must be respected by design for AI-fuelled digital services rolled out to EU users are, of course, the GDPR and the AI Act. All of these require a sensible interpretation, and cooperation among regulators, within the DMA High Level Group but also beyond — will be key to ensuring effective enforcement. National courts, too, are called upon to play a key role in this, as is beginning to emerge in certain jurisdictions. 

 

Seven years on, however, I would also respond to Tim Wu that the failure to act decisively — in the EU, and even less so in the US — to rein in the power of Big Tech has now erupted into an outsized problem, including in terms of harm to our democratic values. This makes it all the more urgent to advance concrete, additional solutions to protect EU citizens — whatever it takes.

[More on Meta Sudans here].