The European Court of Justice imposed a brutal penalty on Google and Apple –

This year for Apple is not going too well so far. In March, the European Commission imposed a record fine of 1.84 billion euros on the company for its unfair and illegal restrictions on the streaming market, in particular against Spotify (which the Cupertino giant has since admitted, but still poked at the rival platform). however, another case has now come to light, and the verdict was not exactly favorable to the apple company.

Back in 2016, the European Commission made a decision obliging Ireland to reclaim tax benefits equivalent to 13 billion euros from Apple, as some companies belonging to the company group received tax benefits provided by Ireland between 1991 and 2014, which are considered state aid. Those involved appealed against this, and in 2020 the European Court of Justice annulled the Commission’s decision at first instance on the grounds that the latter did not adequately prove its truth.

Now, however, the European Court of Justice found that the first-instance decision of the General Court was wrong, therefore overruling and annulling it, it upheld the original decision. The Court explained its decision by accepting the Commission’s ruling that Irish law should have compared the activities of the branches of the companies concerned with the head offices outside Ireland when calculating taxation, not with the activities of other companies in the Apple group.

But the European Court did not spare Google either: with another ruling, it upheld a 2017 decision, the 2.4 billion euro fine imposed on the giant, which was imposed on the company on the grounds that Google had abused its dominance, since its own preferred its product comparison service over others. Of course, Google and its parent company, Alphabet, appealed, but the General Court ruled in favor of the European Commission, and after the case was transferred to the Court of Justice, it approved the punishment, and the decisions became final.