Epic Games has filed a new civil lawsuit against Apple in the US, after the game developer’s popular game ‘Fortnite’ was pulled from the App Store.
The lawsuit alleges that Apple imposes unreasonable restraints and unlawfully maintains a total monopoly in the iOS app market.
Fortnite’s removal was prompted by Epic Games introducing a way for customers to buy items for the game from the daeveloper directly, circumventing Apple’s notoriously high App Store fees. Epic Games offered customers discounts of up to 20% for direct purchases.
Apple requires company’s listing apps on the App Store to pay them 30% of their revenue – this has been at the core of longstanding disputes between Epic Games, as well as other gaming developers, and Apple.
Epic Games has filed legal papers in response to Apple, read more here: https://t.co/c4sgvxQUvb
— Fortnite (@FortniteGame) August 13, 2020
The lawsuit filed by Epic Games stated: “Epic is not seeking monetary compensation from this Court for the injuries it has suffered. Nor is Epic seeking favorable treatment for itself, a single company. Instead, Epic is seeking injunctive relief to allow fair competition in these two key markets that directly affect hundreds of millions of consumers and tens of thousands, if not more, of third-party app developers.”
The two markets that Epic Games is referring to in the above is the iOS App Distribution Market and the iOS In-App Payment Processing Market.
In an email statement to Bloomberg, Apple stated that it removed Fortnite because Epic Games’ changes had the “express intent of violating the App Store guidelines, and that Apple had been key in enabling Epic Games’ success over the last decade.
