Why Apple Intelligence is not Coming to the EU
Apple recently announced a new Artificial Intelligence tool in its devices called Apple Intelligence (AI). Smart, right? Apple publicised multiple features, such as writing tools (summarising, rewriting, proofreading, etc.), a more advanced Siri assistant, a partnership with OpenAI, and others. However, the American giant announced it wouldn’t be releasing Apple Intelligence, as well as other features, to its users in the European Union (EU).
The EU’s antitrust regulation is strict. The Digital Markets Act (DMA) requires tech companies to make the features they are implementing accessible to third parties with the aim to preventing big tech monopolies from gatekeeping technology, levelling the playing ground for European start-ups. Apple, in response, simply withdrew from implementing the features in the old continent and said: “We are concerned that the interoperability requirements of the DMA could force us to compromise the integrity of our products in ways that risk user privacy and data security.”
This is not to say that Apple Intelligence will never come to the EU. Chief Executive Tim Cook stated: “Due to the regulatory uncertainties brought about by the Digital Markets Act (DMA), we do not believe that we will be able to roll out three of these features – iPhone Mirroring, SharePlay Screen Sharing enhancements, and Apple Intelligence – to our EU users,” keeping the option to implement the feature sometime in the future.
It is also not the first time Apple has had setbacks from the EU’s DMA. The Tech Giant was fined €1.8 billion in March over App Store rules. It had to add an EU-mandated charging port to iPhones (USB-C). It also settled a four-year-long antitrust by opening the tap-and-go payments tech to third parties. Apple is also subject to three other ongoing investigations for not complying with the Digital Markets Act requirements. It has also lost an appeal over a €13 billion tax bill in Ireland. With all these regulatory setbacks and fines, it is only natural that Apple refrained from implementing features as complex and groundbreaking as Apple Intelligence, until reviewing extensively how to go around the DMA without jeopardising its users’ privacy and data.
Apple is not the only tech giant holding back from implementing features in the EU. Meta has announced it won’t launch its latest ‘multimodal AI’ models in Europe due to regulatory unpredictability. “We will release a multimodal Llama model over the coming months, but not in the EU due to the unpredictable nature of the European regulatory environment”, said a Meta spokesperson.
Since the latest innovation coming from the other side of the Atlantic isn’t reaching the EU, it is placing the continent a step behind in tech development. However, the European Commission maintains a strong stance on its position, highlighting that the internal market is desirable, and companies are welcome to offer their services in Europe if they comply with EU fair competition rules.
No European unicorn that may come around in the future will have the capacity to compete with the American trillion-dollar companies. Nonetheless, they could join forces. The largest one, Mistral AI, is based in France and has a valuation of €2 billion, focusing on Large Language Models (LLMs) like Chat GPT. The company has, however, been put on the European Commission watchlist after Microsoft’s €15 million investment, in which the institution highlighted that the companies’ relationship could be in breach of EU competition rules due to Microsoft’s partnership with OpenAI.
Taking measures like this could severely restrict European AI start-ups from growing. Start-ups rely upon venture capital, and the companies big enough to invest in them are the tech giants, mostly based in the US. It then begs the question, is the EU becoming a super-regulatory machine punishing non-European tech giants whilst pushing the union back on innovation and development by restricting investment from large companies in the sector? Or, is the Commission doing a good thing in restricting the monopolies from gatekeeping their technology and creating monopolies? The balance between protecting consumer data and fostering technological development remains a critical issue in the global tech industry, especially in Europe.
By: Omar Vasconcelos
