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Leaks reveal that Apple has granted Amazon special consideration to get Prime Video to the App Store
At a hearing before the House Antitrust Subcommittee on Wednesday, Apple CEO Tim Cook said that we extend the law to all developers fairly when it comes to the App Store. Yet the details uncovered by the subcommittee 's report indicate that Apple's senior vice president, Eddy Cue, gave Amazon a special bargain in 2016: Apple will only charge 15 per cent of the payment payments that had been paid into the app, opposed to the normal 30 per cent that other companies needed to turn in.
Cue 's report to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos lists the conditions that have been negotiated:
Now we know how Apple convinced Amazon to finally put Prime Video on the App Store in 2017: Apple agreed to only take 15% of revenue from Prime Video subscriptions made on iOS, versus the 30% they were taking from others. https://t.co/vscPLYKFe2 pic.twitter.com/75e46VGiai
— Mark Gurman (@markgurman) July 29, 2020
The meeting took place in 2016, and Bezos said he was looking for "appropriate commercial terms" before releasing the Prime Video app on Apple 's platforms. Pressed as to whether the provisions could require a decrease in the 30% App Store discount, Bezos told The Verge's Nilay Patel that "private company conversations would stay confidential."
Earlier this year, Amazon's Prime Video iOS and Apple TV devices started encouraging users to make in-app purchases, including renting and purchasing of movies and Television shows. The move was a major step for Amazon, which traditionally did not allow users to rent or buy content from the Prime Video service in the App Store.
According to Bloomberg, Apple is not taking a usual 30 percent break off from these advertising purchases.
The 30% fee on the App Store is part of Spotify 's lawsuit against Apple in the European Union. In recent years , Apple has added rules to the App Store that intentionally restrict competition and stifle creativity at the detriment of customer experience — essentially serving as both a player and a referee to actively hinder other software creators, Daniel Ek, CEO of Spotify, wrote in a 2019 blog post. At Wednesday's briefing, Cook repeatedly pointed out that the premium declines to 15% as consumers reach their second year of service, but it didn't do much to quiet Apple's opponents.
