As it stands, Spotify is probably the king of the hill when it comes to music streaming. Last we heard, Spotify was boasting 100 million subscribers, of which 30 million are paid subscribers. However could it be that Apple is trying to stifle the competition? That seems to be what Spotify is implying in a letter sent from the company’s lawyers to Apple’s lawyers.So far what has happened is that Spotify alleges that Apple will not approve their app’s latest update. The company claims that Apple is demanding that Spotify use the iTunes billing system otherwise it would have violated their app store’s business model rules, hence the rejection, or so they say in a letter sent by Spotify’s general counsel Horacio Gutierrez to Apple.
“This latest episode raises serious concerns under both U.S. and EU competition law. It continues a troubling pattern of behavior by Apple to exclude and diminish the competitiveness of Spotify on iOS and as a rival to Apple Music, particularly when seen against the backdrop of Apple’s previous anticompetitive conduct aimed at Spotify … we cannot stand by as Apple uses the App Store approval process as a weapon to harm competitors.”
Spotify isn’t the first company to try and circumvent the iTunes App Store when it comes to in-app purchases and subscriptions. As Apple takes a 30% cut from each purchase, it isn’t surprising that Spotify encouraged users to try and sign up via its website instead. However earlier this month Apple announced that they would be changing that to a 15/85 split in favor of developers and publishers, but apparently Spotify thinks it isn’t good enough.