A Chinese court has ruled in favor of Apple over controversial app store fees

A court in Shanghai rejected a Chinese consumer’s claim that Apple was abusing its market dominance by charging high fees on the iOS App Store, marking a victory for the U.S. tech giant in the face of increased antitrust scrutiny around the world.

Although Apple has a dominant position in the iOS application distribution market in mainland China, according to the ruling of the Intellectual Property Court in Shanghai, it did not abuse this power and did not impose unfairly high commissions.

The lawsuit was filed in 2021 by an individual named Jin Xin, who claimed that she had to pay more for some apps on iPhone than on Android phones due to the 30 percent commission Apple charged to app developers.

The Shanghai court said that after comparing app store commissions, it did not find that the commissions charged by Apple were “significantly higher” than those on Android platforms and that there was no evidence to suggest that these commissions directly led to higher prices for consumers , according to the verdict obtained by the South China Morning Post has not yet been published.

Apple’s App Store practices have long been the subject of complaints from app developers and have recently come under increased antitrust scrutiny from global regulators.

Last month, the European Commission fined Apple more than 1.8 billion euros ($1.95 billion) for preventing music app makers from informing iOS users about alternative subscription offers available outside their iOS apps, saying the company had abused its position dominant.

In March, the U.S. Department of Justice sued Apple for a number of practices, including blocking non-iOS apps and blocking so-called super apps, accusations that Apple said “were wrong on fact and law” and that it would “strongly defend against” .

The Shanghai court ruling marks a victory for Apple, which faces increasing difficulties in the country amid intense competition from domestic handset makers such as Huawei Technologies. Earlier this month, Apple offered consumers in mainland China up to 23% off iPhone 15 models purchased from online stores to boost sluggish sales.

In a blog post published on the social media platform WeChat, Jin’s legal representative in the Shanghai case wrote that he planned to appeal to the Supreme People’s Court of China.

They “strongly believe” that Apple’s practices constitute an abuse of its dominant market position and violate the right of Chinese consumers to choose and engage in fair transactions, Wang Qiongfei, founding partner of law firm Kinding, said in a blog post.

Apple’s practices have also increased operating costs for Chinese companies and “destroyed the global competitiveness of China’s internet industry,” Wang wrote.

Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday.