European Union: Competition authority maintains ByteDance’s “gatekeeper” status

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – TikTok owner ByteDance lost a court challenge on Wednesday to remove its “gatekeeper” status, a designation created under the EU’s Digital Markets Regulation (DMA), in a move that bolsters the EU’s competition watchdog amid growing pressure to regulate big tech companies.

Since the adoption of the DMA, which seeks to ensure fair competition and greater consumer choice, “gatekeepers” have been required to make their messaging apps interoperable with those of their competitors, to let users decide which apps to pre-install on their devices, and not to favor their own services over those of their rivals.

ByteDance had argued that its designation could undermine the DMA’s goal of protecting dominant companies from new competitors such as TikTok, which it said does not have an established position.

The Luxembourg-based Court of First Instance sided with the European Commission and dismissed its challenge, finding that ByteDance had not sufficiently substantiated its arguments.

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The judges considered that the company met the conditions for the status in view of its market value, its number of users in the EU and the number of years during which this number of users was reached, putting it on an equal footing with its competitors Meta Platforms and Alphabet.

ByteDance said it was disappointed by the decision, but can still appeal the ruling to the European Court of Justice.

“We will now evaluate next steps, but we have already taken steps to comply with the DMA obligations before the deadline last March,” a TikTok spokesperson said.

The Commission has taken note of the judgment and will study it, it said in an emailed statement.

Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Booking.com, Meta Platforms and Microsoft have also been named as gatekeepers.

(Report by Foo Yun Chee; French version by Mathias de Rozario, edited by Augustin Turpin)