US tech giants spent $35.3 million on lobbying in the first six months of the year, up 15% from the first half of 2021. Amazon is the biggest spender.
The noose is tightening around the Gafam, and they have understood this well. To counter the antitrust legislation currently under discussion in the US Congress, Amazon, Apple, Google and others are increasing their spending to influence Capitol decisions as they see fit.
Thus, the American technology giants spent 35.3 million dollars on lobbying in the first six months of the year, an increase of 15% compared to the first half of 2021, reveals Bloomberg. These behemoths spent $17.3 million in the second quarter, putting the technology industry ahead of other sectors, such as the pharmaceutical field.
$10 million raised by Amazon in six months
Among the Gafams, Amazon is the biggest spender, with nearly $5 million spent on lobbying in the second quarter, up 2.5% from the same period last year. The American e-commerce and cloud giant had already paid a similar sum in the first quarter, almost $10 million injected in six months.
In addition, Google spent $2.8 million in the second quarter, up 32% from the previous year, but down 6.4% from the nearly $3 million injected during the three first months of the year. For its part, Microsoft spent $2.4 million between April and June, down 2.4% year-on-year, while Apple spent $1.9 million in the second quarter, down from $2.5 million mobilized between January and March.
Among the texts that greatly worry the Gafam, the American Innovation and Choice Online Act, an American version of the Digital Markets Act (DMA), particularly shakes the American technology giants. And for good reason: this new legislation must prevent Google, Amazon and others from promoting their own products and services on their platforms to the detriment of the competition. This text must apply to companies whose market capitalization exceeds 550 billion dollars and which have more than 50 million monthly active users, which is obviously no coincidence. Therefore, the Gafam line up tens of millions of dollars to torpedo this new legislation.