On the 4th of March, Apple was reportedly handed a fine for anti-competitive practices of about 1.84 billion euros (£1.57 billion) by the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm. Th is fine was said to be the build-up of long-running antitrust investigation triggered by Spotify’s complaint back in 2019. The European Commission initiated an antitrust probe in response to Spotify’s allegations, investigating concerns that Apple was actively obstructing apps within its App Store. The investigation focused on the accusation that Apple hindered these apps from adequately informing iOS users about alternative and more costeffective music subscription services available outside the app ecosystem. The anti-steering provision enforced by Apple on these apps was considered by itself to be enough evidence for a violation and breach of Article 102(a) of the TFEU. The imposed fine was originally reported to be 500 million euros (£426 million), now a near four times of what it was supposed to be. The itemised breakdown? A basic element of 40 million euros - described as a “parking ticket” for the now multi-trillion dollar company by Margarethe Vestager, European Competition Commissioner - plus an additional 1.8 billion euro penalty served in the name of “deterrence”, amounting to about 0.5% of Apple’s global turnover as reported in their financial report of 2022. According to analyst Ryan Reith at International Data Corporation (IDC), although a hefty fine on the surface, Apple will likely be able to handle it without any immediate cash impact. Apple shares were subsequently down 3.2% on Monday Afternoon (4th March), following the press release of the EU Commission’s fine. However as a regular consumer of the technology and services, you might be curious as to how this may affect you. After all if you had intended to subscribe to Spotify’s music streaming service, you still would have paid for the same price regardless of which platform, app or web, you did it through right? You’d be wrong. Apple charges a 30 per cent fee for all sales made through the App Store, a cost that the commission has identifi ed to be likely passed on to consumers to bear the burden in the form of higher subscription charges. Certain subscription companies such as Spotify, have been able to circumvent this surcharge, but at the cost of degraded user-experiences as iOS users are required to actively seek out relevant offers outside the app, potentially leading to unsuccessful attempts at securing subscriptions from would be consumers due to the inability of finding the right one independently. The EU Commission, following Vestager’s order, will be enforcing Apple’s removal of the App Store restriction. Which means we will likely see lower prices for third party iOS services and subscriptions, that or at the very least, a higher profit margin for app developers.