European Commission still investigating Apple

While the European Commission has found no evidence of collusion between Apple and major labels – where it was believed the tech giant aimed to penalise its streaming competitors – Apple is still being investigated in Europe and the US.

In July it was revealed the Federal Trade Commission and the EU were in discussions with some of the tech giant’s rivals like Spotify, Pandora and Rdio over whether Apple should be taking a smaller cut of App Store and iTunes sales.

Apple currently takes a 30% cut of monthly subscriptions fees for rival music streaming apps downloaded in its App Store. Because of this, streaming services which charge AU$11.99 for a month’s subscription (similar to Apple Music) have pushed their prices up in the App Store to AU$14.99 or have cut into their profit margin by 30%.

Spotify has been referring to the 30% as an “Apple tax” since May, and in July it emailed its subscribers requesting them to cancel their paid subscriptions through the iTunes App Store.

“Apple charges 30 percent on all payments made through iTunes,” the email read. “[…] If you switch your payments to Spotify.com, there are no transaction costs and you’ll save money.”

As the EU’s investigation nowturns toward the “Apple Tax”, Spotify is staying ahead of the curb. In April the streaming giant hired two lobbying firms in Europe to represent it before the European Unionand four lobby firms in Washington D.Cto enter talks with policymakers about competition, licensing and something it’s calling "platform neutrality."