Proposed Solutions for Big Tech in the United States: Out of Step or Déjà Vu?

The U.S. House Report on digital markets suggests adopting important changes to U.S. antitrust law. If implemented, the proposed changes (particularly those related to unilateral practices) would bring U.S. antitrust law closer to EU competition law, by lowering the burden of proof and expanding existing prohibitions. Yet, the experience from the EU suggests that the proposed reforms are unlikely to provide an adequate solution for the problems identified with digital markets. In December 2020, the European Commission presented a proposed text for the Digital Markets Act, a regulation that seek to ensure “contestable and fair” digital markets. The regulation stems from the explicit recognition that even a broader competition law regime, such as the one available in the EU, cannot address the problems with big tech. One could thus question whether expanding U.S. antitrust law is likely to provide an adequate relief in dealing with the problems described in the House Report.

By UrSka PetrovCiC & Gonçalo Coelho¹

On October 6, 2020, the Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial and Administrative Law of the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary issued a report on the investigation of competition in digital markets.² The Report summarizes the main findings of a sixteen-month investigation into the business conducts of four large U.S. tech corporations — Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and