The EU announced under the Digital Markets Act that the Cupertino, California-based company will have to comply with strict new regulations for its operating systems to be fully interoperable with other technologies. The authority overseeing the Act is based in Brussels and has given the company six months to comply or face sanctions.
With this announcement, the EU intends to oblige Apple to reengineer its services to allow rival companies to access iPhone and iPad operating systems.
"Today is the first time we have used specification processes under the DMA to guide Apple towards effective compliance with interoperability obligations," EU competition chief Margrethe Vestager said. "Effective interoperability, for example with smartphones and their operating systems, plays an important role in this."
One of the DMA's goals is to ensure that all developers can access key Apple features, such as Siri's voice commands and its payments chip.
The EU will later launch a formal investigation into whether Apple has complied with the DMA, which could eventually lead to hefty fines of up to 10% of global annual sales. Let us mention that a parallel investigation is already underway for App Store regulations for developers, which could also lead to heavy penalties.
