TikTok has appealed its gatekeeper designation under the Digital Markets Act. The platform says, among other things, that it does not meet all gatekeeper standards. Meta also appealed this week against his gatekeeper status.
TikTok filed its appeal on Thursday, Reuters news agency writes. “Our appeal is based on the belief that our designation threatens to undermine the DMA’s stated purpose by protecting de facto gatekeepers from new competitors like TikTok,” the company said in a statement to that news agency.
The Chinese social media platform says, among other things, that it has been active in the EU for only five years. TikTok says it is “arguably the most capable competitor to more established platform companies.” The DMA aims to help companies compete with technology giants, which the EU believes can use their market position to push smaller rivals out of the market. Since TikTok is a relatively new platform, the company doesn’t consider itself an established gatekeeper.
The company also says it doesn’t meet the minimum sales threshold to be considered a gatekeeper. Platforms must have annual European sales of at least €7.5 billion and a total market capitalization of €75 billion to be appointed as a DMA gatekeeper. TikTok claims that its gatekeeper status is based primarily on the global market value of parent company ByteDance and primarily on inactive business units in Europe, Reuters writes.
The EU announced the first gatekeepers under the DMA in September: Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta, Microsoft and TikTok. Collectively, these companies have 22 services that fall under the competition law. Meta already objected to its appointment as a gatekeeper under the DMA on Wednesday. The company did this specifically for Messenger and Marketplace, but not for Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. Microsoft and Google decided not to appeal. Apple has not yet announced whether it will appeal or not. Tweakers previously wrote a backstory on DMA.
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