(5) Whether the “soft today / threat for tomorrow” approach will work, it’s doubtful. I believe fines could have been higher, and the strategic result would have been the same. Companies are likely to claim that fines tantamount to tariffs no matter whether they are 200 mln or 2 bln.

(4) In summary: the Commission could not ignore the geopolitical context – that’s why they waited so long to release the fines. They took it easy today, but they keep their options open to escalate later.

(a) cease-and-desist order to Apple – by June 22, if Apple will not have complied with DMA, it may be fined by the day for non compliance

(b) preliminary findings for another Apple store case

3) However, this is a package – so fines should not be considered in isolation. Together with the small fines, EC gave another two little carrots (closing another Apple case and removing Meta’s marketplace from the DMA scope). But also two sticks:

2) If considered in isolation, the fines (500 mln Apple / 200 mln Meta) are very small. A back of the envelop calculation shows that they amount to approx. 0.1% of their 2024 turnover. Nothing compared to the profits they made with the infringement

1) The decisions were published today because the Google antitrust case in the US opened a window of opportunity. It helps EC frame the decisions as unrelated to the trade spat

It is comparable, not in terms of the harm that your example entails, obviously. But in terms of the reliability of the tools that we use.

The fact that OpenAI is American, not Chinese, gives a false sense of security (especially in this historical moment).

In the near future, what do we expect ChatGPT to answer to the question: “where does the Gulf Stream originate”?