Apple CEO Tim Cook to Meet EU Antitrust Chief Next Week - MacRumors
Skip to Content

Apple CEO Tim Cook to Meet EU Antitrust Chief Next Week

by

Apple CEO Tim Cook will meet the European Union's antitrust chief, Margrethe Vestager, next week amid a series of disputes with the organization (via Reuters).

tim cook europe privacy
Vestager is also set to meet the chief executives of Alphabet, Broadcom, and Nvidia, as well as senior executives from OpenAI. The meetings will take place in San Francisco and Palo Alto on Thursday and Friday next week, and will focus on European competition policy and digital regulation.

In December, Apple reportedly floated the ability for Apple Pay rivals to access the iPhone's NFC technology for contactless payments in the EU. The offer is designed to settle an ongoing antitrust dispute and avoid a potential fine. The European Commission is believed to be seeking feedback from rivals and customers before accepting the offer, so it is highly likely that this matter will be discussed.

Apple is also facing several other challenges in the EU that will almost certainly be the subject of discussion, such as a $14 billion tax dispute. Most strikingly, new EU rules such as the Digital Markets Act (DMA) designate major tech companies as "gatekeepers" and compel them to open up their various services and platforms to other companies and developers. The DMA is expected to force Apple to make significant changes to the way the App Store, FaceTime, and Siri work in Europe. For example, Apple will next year be obliged to allow users to install third-party app stores and sideload apps, as well as give developers the ability to promote their offers outside the ‌‌‌‌App Store‌‌‌‌ and use third-party payment systems.

Note: Due to the political or social nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Political News forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Tags: Apple Antitrust, European Union, Tim Cook

Popular Stories

iPhone Ultra Fold Feature

Foldable iPhone Development History and Price Revealed in New Report

Tuesday September 8, 2026 5:55 am PDT by
Former Apple CEO Tim Cook played a major role in the development of the foldable iPhone, which could reach around $3,000 with storage upgrades, according to new details shared by Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Early in the development of the foldable iPhone, the company reportedly targeted a starting retail price of $1,999, hoping to come under the "potentially controversial $2,000 barrier." The...
Read Full Article • 142 comments
tim cook john ternus apple ceo

Tim Cook Comments on His Final Day as Apple CEO

Monday August 31, 2026 8:39 am PDT by
Tim Cook will be stepping down as Apple's CEO on September 1, with the company's hardware engineering John Ternus set to take over. With the transition set to take place tomorrow, there have been quite a few headlines about Cook lately. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. The latest story comes from 9to5Mac, which said it has obtained Cook's full memo to Apple...
Read Full Article • 124 comments
Tim Cook Apple Logo

Tim Cook Steps Down as Apple CEO Tomorrow

Monday August 31, 2026 5:42 am PDT by
The end of an era is upon us, as Tim Cook will be stepping down as Apple's CEO on September 1, after 15 years of leading the company. Cook has been Apple's CEO since 2011 Tomorrow, Apple's hardware engineering chief John Ternus will become the company's next CEO. Cook will remain at Apple as the executive chairman of the company's board of directors. In this new role, Apple said Cook will...
Read Full Article • 92 comments

Top Rated Comments

A
ashdelacroix
35 months ago
America creates, the EU regulates. Sorry, America. I say this as a Brit who is happy to be out of the EU. This is an institution that, rightly, has concerns about global corporations with monopoly practices, but who will damage consumer choice and security by forcing my message product of choice to provide backdoors to competing message products that I do not wish to use but, tacitly, will have a share in.
Score: 17 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Xenc Avatar
Xenc
35 months ago
You tell em, EU! 💪
Score: 17 Votes (Like | Disagree)
C
CarAnalogy
35 months ago

America creates, the EU regulates.
Honestly this doesn’t actually sound that bad. It’s well established that American corporations will take every inch and then some. That unbridled power does lead to innovation as well as abuse.

We have already seen tangible benefits from things like GDPR. Do we really want to just wait around for the American government to decide we deserve things like privacy laws and data portability?

Yes the EU goes too far, but American legislators go too far the other way. Look at the downright lies Elizabeth Warren is telling about Beeper Mini and Apple, somehow twisting it so that Apple is “blocking” Beeper’s services. I don’t think she’s stupid enough to actually believe that, which leaves lying as the most likely explanation.

It is interesting that Vestager is coming to the United States for this meeting. I would actually like to see more cooperation between American tech companies and the EU.

I know this post is just begging for downvotes, and I don’t like how it seems the EU is targeting “big tech” but so is the US government. At least most of the EU ministers seem to have some basic understanding of technology.

By the way for reference here is the Warren quote:


Green bubble texts are less secure. So why would Apple block a new app allowing Android users to chat with iPhone users on iMessage? Big Tech executives are protecting profits by squashing competitors.

Chatting between different platforms should be easy and secure.
I mean what is this? Anyone with any basic tech knowledge whatsoever understands that that is a deliberate twisting of the situation. This person is a US Senator. Someone should stop people with such power from saying such stupid things. Does she have no aids or advisors or does she just not listen to them or are they all lobbyists or what?

You’ll notice that the EU never said anything about Beeper.
Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)
I7guy Avatar
I7guy
35 months ago
Going to be an interesting meeting. Would like to be a fly on the wall.
Score: 10 Votes (Like | Disagree)
WarmWinterHat Avatar
WarmWinterHat
35 months ago

America creates, the EU regulates. Sorry, America. I say this as a Brit who is happy to be out of the EU. This is an institution that, rightly, has concerns about global corporations with monopoly practices, but who will damage consumer choice and security by forcing my message product of choice to provide backdoors to competing message products that I do not wish to use but, tacitly, will have a share in.
I like that idea, since our Congress is too spineless and paid-off to do anything about US industries and tech companies.

We (US) have abdicated our responsibility to the populace.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
W
wikiverse
35 months ago

Developers already have the ability to promote their offers outside the App Store. iPhones and iPads have internet connections and allow app users to access information via the web/social media/email/texts/push notifications etc. The idea that iOS/iPadOS users are limited to the information they see in the App Store is ludicrous.
I think you misunderstood the article

"... install third-party app stores and sideload apps ('https://www.macrumors.com/2023/04/17/app-sideloading-support-coming-ios-17/'), as well as give developers the ability to promote their offers outside the ‌‌‌App Store‌‌‌ and use third-party payment systems" within the app itself.

This is what the EU seeks to change.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Read All Comments