Margrethe Vestager, Big Tech’s European nemesis, reportedly steps down later this year

Margrethe Vestager, the European Union’s commissioner for competition, won’t be back for a third term and will be stepping down this year. According to the Financial Times, the Danish government will be nominating a different candidate as EU commissioner after Vestager’s political party didn’t do well in the previous election. Vestager is known for being one of Europe’s top antitrust authorities and has been been tough on big tech companies during her term. The market abuse cases she has filed over the years inspired the creation of the Digital Markets Act (DMA), which is a regulation meant to ensure that large companies don’t abuse their market power.

Apple, Google, Meta and other big players in the industry have had to implement changes to how they conduct business after the DMA came into force. Google, for instance, said it will start displaying price comparison results in Search from external aggregators when looking up services, such as flights or hotels. It will be easier for Android users to change search engines, as well. Apple said it will let companies set up their own app stores for iOS, but it conjured its own stringent rules that developers will have to follow.

The EU, under Vestager, started investigating Apple, Alphabet and Meta in March to look into their efforts to comply with the DMA. In an interview with CNBC afterward, Vestager said that Apple has “very serious” issues when it comes to non-compliance. Vestager also ruled way back in 2016 that Irish tax authorities had given Apple a “sweetheart deal” for over a decade and had ordered the company to pay Ireland €14.3 billion ($15.72 billion) in taxes. EU’s General Court overturned her order in 2020, but the commission had appealed that decision.

The European Commission also fined Google €4.3 billion ($5 billion) for antitrust violations surrounding Android and $2.8 billion for favoring its own comparison shopping services over others in Search under her leadership. More recently, the EU slapped Apple with a €1.8 billion ($1.95 billion) fine for suppressing music streaming services on the App Store that rival its own.

European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen will start interviewing new candidates next week, the Times said. Vestager’s replacement is expected to replace her this autumn.

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