The verdict was achieved today in the Epic game vs. Apple court case and legal battle which effectively resumed in August 2020. Apple is likely to appeal the part of the decision that will enable additional permissions for iOS application developers. For now, the verdict is that the application developer will not be prohibited to add a purchase mechanism in their application.
The verdict from Epic Games vs Apple Trial by District Judge U.S. Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers sets commands that willrequire Apple to allow developers in the US to enter the payment system in their own application through various ways. These include metadata buttons, external links, or other calls to act that direct customers to the purchase mechanism.
This verdict also prohibits Apple from stopping developers from communicating with customers through “contact points obtained voluntarily from customers through account registration in the application.” This is all because the court found that Apple was involved in “anticompompetitive behavior under the California competition law.”
In all other things, the court was found to support Apple. The court cannot conclude that Apple is a monopoly company under the Federal or State Antitrust Law. Rogers Judges ruled including the following: “While the court found that Apple enjoyed a large enough market share of more than 55% and a tremendous profit margin, these factors alone did not show antitrust behavior. Success is not illegal.”
It was ruled by Judge Rogers that the epic game needs to pay damage equal to 30% of the income collected by the company through the Fortnite application on iOS through direct payment options. This command includes the months between August and October 2020 (each month when the application is available for iOS with the direct payment option), plus iOS-based profit from fortnite collected between November 2020 and 10 October 2021, with interest.
In the three months mentioned, Epic Games reported revenue from iOS $ 12,167,719 USD. About 30% of it is $ 3,650,315 USD. The possibility of an epic game needs to pay Apple a large amount of cash, in any case. If you want to investigate this case further, go to the US District Court for the northern district of California, or just emphasize it to the previous investigation timeline below.