The Endless "War" Of "Apple Tax"

The lawsuit between Epic Games and apple, a world-famous game company, has escalated again, and apple has begun to fight back against the previous complaints of Epic Games. Apple will ban players from using their apple account to log into epic from September 11, according to Epic Games on its official social media account. The latest news is that Apple has decided to extend the ban indefinitely.

In addition, on September 8, apple filed a counterclaim against Epic Games in the Northern District Court of California, claiming that epic just didn't want to pay anything for the huge income it got from the app store, which violated the relevant regulations of Apple's app store for in app shopping.

Apple hopes that the court will hold Epic Games liable for breach of contract, let Epic Games compensate apple for the losses caused by the direct payment method of Fortress night, and permanently prohibit all applications of Epic Games from using third-party payment.

In mid August, epic sued apple for removing its "Fortress night" and withdrawing its developer account, which damaged the interests of consumers and violated the anti-monopoly law, and asked the court to issue a preliminary injunction against Apple's practices.

At present, the court does not fully support Epic Games. Judge Yvonne gonzelez Rogers passed a temporary injunction on August 24, requiring apple to restore its epic games developer account, but agreed that fortress night violates Apple's app store policy and apple can continue to ban fortress night. The court will hold a preliminary injunction hearing on September 28.

The game draws a big profit cake

Its 350 million game engine is one of the most popular game engines in the world. As one of Tencent's most successful investments, Epic Games just announced its $250 million capital injection from Sony in July this year, making the company's latest valuation of $17 billion. Tencent's early investment of $330 million in its early years has exceeded 20 times in six years.

For a long time, Epic Games criticized Apple's app store for its high proportion of 30% of its shares, trying to bypass the in app purchase (IAP) approach. On August 13, Epic Games began offering fortress night IOS players a direct payment method that bypasses in app purchases, which is $2 cheaper. According to Epic Games, more than half of IOS players choose to use direct payment instead of IAP.

However, apple immediately removed fortress night from the app store and terminated the developer account of Epic Games for violating the app store policy.

Looking at Apple's "app store audit guide", the reporter found that Apple definitely requires app developers to use the items purchased in app, and shall not direct users to use buttons, external links or other call to action terms for non app purchased items.

It is worth mentioning that Epic Games also filed a similar lawsuit against Google on August 13, claiming that the 30% percentage of Google play was too high, and that it violated the anti-monopoly law by taking advantage of its dominant position in the app distribution market. In the view of some industry insiders, a game company challenges the app store platform with such a high profile, playing the profit calculation behind it.

"Compared with many other application categories, the revenue extraction system of the app store has a great impact on game developers. Although some of the games are free to download, the subsequent game operation has a large number of value-added services such as paid virtual props, and 30% of the proportion has swallowed up the interests of game developers. The cake is too big. " Yuan yingzi, founder of the Europe China Video Game Association, said in an interview with 21st century economic reporter.

Is the proportion of 30% high?

According to Google and Apple's app store, they will charge 30% of the amount of information disclosed in the app store.

Zhu Junchao, founder of nuocheng game law and a lawyer for the game industry, told 21st century economic reporter: "all parties contribute to the final release of a game from the production of the game R & D party to the packaging and sales of the game distribution operator, so it is natural to divide the income of the game production."

How about the proportion of 30% in the industry?

There are various types of game distribution channels, such as app store of IOS system, Google play, Android multiple brand mobile app stores and third-party app stores, as well as various specialized game platform channels. The reporter learned from a number of game company employees that the fixed proportion of Apple App store and Google play is 30%, and that of most other mobile phone brand app stores and third-party app stores in China is generally 50%. However, the bargaining power of each game distribution company is different, and the proportion can be reduced to 20% or even lower.

Take Tencent mobile game platform as an example. According to the official website of Tencent open platform, 60% of developers and 40% of Tencent share the mode of online game intermodal cooperation.

A game operation staff member of a listed company told reporters: "the percentage of third-party app stores seems to be higher than that of Apple App store. The main reason is that the commission fees of these platforms also include transportation costs such as advertising and customer acquisition, so we can't simply compare which proportion is higher."

Although many game distribution channels have a draw mechanism, only apple stands at the forefront of public opinion. In fact, the reason why most of Apple's customers can get more revenue from the app store is that they can get more revenue from the app store than from the app store

According to the estimated data of sensor tower, as of August 13, 2020, the total mobile terminal revenue of Fortress night is $293 million, of which nearly $283 million comes from the app store. Among the 31 million downloads this year, the app store contributed about $20 million.

Epic accuses apple of violating antitrust law

According to Epic Games, Apple has used its monopoly position in the IOS app distribution market for many years to coerce app developers to use their in app IAP payment method, which eliminates market competition, leads to a high 30% Apple tax and violates the anti-monopoly law.

In Zhu Junchao's view, although it seems reasonable for game developers and operating distributors to get the corresponding share, there is another mystery in the apple ecosystem.

On Apple's IOS system, only app store is an official channel to download software. Users must use Apple's payment system in the app store. "In fact, this has formed a substantial monopoly. Game developers have no choice but to accept Apple's sharing agreement, otherwise they will not be able to operate their own games on Apple's mobile phone." Zhu Junchao told reporters that compared with Epic Games' own game store, epic only took 12% of the total, which is not difficult to understand why epic rose up in this division with apple.

Zhu Junchao said that in recent years, the game industry has developed rapidly and the quality of games has been greatly improved. As a result, the cost of game research and development has risen rapidly. In such an environment, the 30% Apple tax is particularly offensive.

Apple tax and in app purchases have attracted collective attention around the world. Earlier this month, Fedor tumosov, Russia's state-run dumasov, introduced a draft bill to set the maximum Commission limit on Apple's app store to 20% and force Apple devices to allow third-party app stores. Last month, a coalition of South Korean start-ups representing several app developers submitted a petition to the Korean Communications Commission asking for an investigation into whether Apple and Google violated laws related to in app purchases. (Editor: Zhang Xing)

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