U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, the Senate’s top Democrat on antitrust issues, said Apple’s announcement that it would introduce the AirTag tracking device is “timely,” as it is the kind of conduct its commission intends to discuss at a meeting Wednesday. .
Apple Inc. (AAPL.O) announced Tuesday that it will begin selling AirTags, which can be attached to items such as car keys to help users find them when they are lost. The move puts Apple in direct competition with Tile, which has been selling a similar tracking device for more than a decade.
At the meeting, Kyle Andeer, Apple’s compliance director, will testify, as well as Kirsten Daru, general counsel for Tile.
“It’s appropriate, given that this is the kind of behavior we’re going to talk about at the meeting,” Klobuchar said, adding that criticism of Apple and Google app stores didn’t get the control they deserved. “He focused a little less on this than I think he should have.”
Apple said its AirTags are an addition to its FindMy app, which is used to locate lost Apple devices and share user locations, and was introduced in 2010, before Tile was established. Apple last month opened its operating system for third-party article trackers and said Chipolo, a startup that competes with both Tile and Apple’s new AirTags, is using the system.
“We’ve always adopted competition as the best way to generate great experiences for our customers, and we’ve worked hard to build a platform in iOS that allows third-party developers to thrive,” Apple said in a statement.
Others on the witness list are Wilson White, chief executive for government affairs, White White, Spotify, Horacio Gutierrez, and Match Group, Jared Sine.
App makers, such as the Spotify music streaming service and the Match dating app, have long complained that mandatory revenue sharing and strict inclusion rules set by the Apple App Store for iPhone and iPad, along with Google store for Android devices, amounts to anti-competitive behavior.
In its testimony, Match’s Sine is expected to claim that both Google and Apple have a onerous percentage of 30% of any digital transaction, increasing prices for consumers.
Match pays nearly $ 500 million in fees annually to the app store, the company’s largest expense, Sine says.
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