Apple offers rivals access to tap-and-go payment tech to resolve EU antitrust case

LONDON – Apple has promised to open up its tap-and-go cell payment machine to rivals, the European Union mentioned Friday, because the U.S. tech corporate seeks to resolve an antitrust case and steer clear of a nice that doubtlessly may well be price billions.

Apple proposed letting third-party cell pockets and payment provider suppliers access the contactless payment serve as on its iOS running machine, the EU mentioned. The 27-nation bloc now is looking for comments from “all interested parties” on the changes before making a decision on the case.

The European Commission, the bloc’s executive arm and top antitrust enforcer, accused Apple in 2022 of abusing its dominant position by limiting access to its mobile payment technology.

Brussels has been using antitrust cases and new digital laws to rein in the power of Apple and other tech giants and protect consumers.

The commission alleged that Apple was restricting competition by blocking developers of rival mobile wallet apps from accessing the near-field communication, or NFC, technology used by its Apple Pay system. That prevents those developers from offering competing services on Apple devices, the EU said.

Breaches of EU competition law can draw fines worth up to 10% of a company’s annual global revenue, which in Apple’s case, could amount to tens of billions of euros (dollars).

The changes Apple is proposing to ease EU antitrust concerns would last for a decade and apply to rival mobile wallet makers as well as iOS users in the bloc’s 27 countries, plus Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein, the commission said.

Apple said that through “ongoing discussions” with the fee, it presented to supply builders of payment, banking and virtual pockets apps with an possibility for his or her customers to “make NFC contactless payments from within their iOS apps, separate from Apple Pay and Apple Wallet.”