Ex-Post Application of Structural Remedies to Large Online Platforms at a National Level
Büyük Çevrimiçi Platformlara Yapısal Çözümlerin Ulusal Düzeyde Ex-Post Uygulaması
Muzaffer EROĞLU, Alptekin KÖKSAL
The enormous market power enables Online Platforms to leverage their data and economic power to spread into the digital sector. Abuse of dominant position through various means, mainly exclusionary conduct, such as leveraging or self-preferencing, can be seen in the conduct of Online Platforms. Most countries, including international authorities such as the EU Commission, concluded that there is a gap in the law in the context of digital competition and decided to fill this gap through extensive regulation. However, digital life has just blossomed and is proliferating with technological development. Regulating a fast-changing and developing area would harm its character and innovative nature. Therefore, instead of a rushed ambition to regulate the area, which could be disruptive and harmful to the competition, all alternative methods should be considered before taking ambitious steps. In that case, a well-defined ex-post method could become a better alternative to address the competition problems in the digital sector. Therefore, this paper argues that recent competition interventions in the digital sector seem to be quite relevant and effective against competition problems present in the sector. Instead of an ex-ante regulation, which may hinder innovation and development in the long term, an ex-post could be the relevant solution to the current situation.
Competition, Structural Remedies, Ex-post Regulation, Digital Sector, Online Platforms, Digital Markets Act.
Büyük Platformların verilerinden ve ekonomik güçlerinden yararlanarak elde ettiği pazar gücü, teşebbüslerin bütün dijital sektöre yayılmasını sağlamaktadır. Büyük Platformların pazarda hâkim durumları kaynaklı davranışlarında, hâkim durumun çeşitli yollarla, özellikle kaldıraç etkisi yoluyla bir pazardaki gücün bir başka pazara aktarılması veya kendini tercih etme gibi dışlayıcı davranışlar yoluyla kötüye kullanılması mümkündür. Avrupa Birliği gibi uluslararası aktörler de dahil olmak üzere çoğu ülke, dijital rekabet bağlamında rekabet mevzuatının uygulanmasında sorunlar olduğu sonucuna varmış ve bu sorunun üstesinden kapsamlı ex-ante düzenlemelerle gelmeye çalışmaktadırlar. Bir başka deyişle dijital piyasaları regüle etmeye çalışmaktadırlar. Ancak dijital sosyal ve ticari hayat yeni yeni ortaya çıkmakta ve teknolojik gelişmelerle birlikte de hızla ilerlemekte ve değişmektedir. Hızla değişen ve gelişen bir alanı düzenlemek, elbette onun karakterine, işleyişine ve pek tabii yenilikçi yapısına zarar verebilir. Bu nedenle, rekabeti bozucu ve zararlı olabilecek, aceleci bir ex-ante düzenleme çabası yerine, bu tarz iddialı adımlar atmadan önce tüm alternatif yöntemlerin sonuna kadar değerlendirilmesi gerekmektedir. Bu durumda, iyi tanımlanmış ve düzgün uygulanan bir ex-post yöntem, dijital sektördeki rekabet sorunlarının çözümünde daha iyi bir alternatif haline gelebilmektedir. Sonuç olarak bu makale, dijital sektöre yönelik ulusal düzeyde son dönemde yapılan rekabet müdahalelerinin sektörde mevcut rekabet sorunlarına karşı oldukça doğru ve etkili göründüğünü ileri sürmektedir. Uzun vadede yenilik ve gelişmeyi engelleyebilecek bir ex-ante düzenleme yerine, ex-post bir düzenleme mevcut duruma uygun bir çözüm olabilir.
Rekabet, Yapısal Çözümler, Ex-post Düzenleme, Dijital Sektör, Çevrimiçi Platformlar, Dijital Piyasalar Yasası.
I. INTRODUCTION
The emergence of the Internet and technological developments afterward have led to the creation of small, medium, and big-scale online platforms. Subsequently, some platforms, such as Amazon, Apple, Alphabet (Google), Microsoft, Meta (Facebook), Alibaba, Tencent, and WeChat - all considered Large Online Platforms, have gained unprecedented market power recently. These platforms are among the world’s most successful and thus ranked as the highest undertakings in the top ten largest companies, with over a trillion-dollar market capitalization1. One of the primary sources of the unprecedented market power of technology giants stems from the effective utilization of data and data analytics in their respective platforms. In addition to data collection and utilization methods, technology giants are experts in mergers and acquisitions (M&As), in which they acquire start-ups to utilize data capabilities.
In recent decades, technology giants have extensively used mergers without attracting competition authorities’ attention. Hundreds of acquisitions have been made by technology giants -the Big Five (Amazon, Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, and Meta)- over the last decade2. These acquisitions have created an extensive discussion as these acquisitions are defined as “R&D (Research and Development) mergers” by acquirers. Still, many of them were considered a “killer acquisition” type where dominants buy out undertakings that are already competitors or could have become their rivals. Either way, killer acquisitions or not, the Big Five have utilized this method to swallow smaller undertakings, their data, and technology. By this means, technology giants leveraged their market powers or entrenched their positions in specific markets. At that time, none of these M&As had been blocked, and only a few had been approved with conditions3. Most of these merger investigations overlooked the non-horizontal links between the platform owner and the acquired. The European Commission, in recent investigations such as Google/Fitbit, acknowledges this issue today4.
As a result of leveraging market power and acquisitions, technology giants successfully externalized indirect network effects, and markets tipped in favor of their platforms. In other words, a value chain has been created through data collection and network effects. This power enables them to enter new digital markets quickly as they have the data and economic power. Accordingly, many platforms’ owners operate as ecosystems5. In other words, consumers are offered many different types of goods and services with various underlying business interests. On top of that, platform owners have unique dual roles in platforms. For example, Amazon is an intermediary between third-party companies and consumers; Amazon is also a competitor to these companies. In time, platforms have become huge, and commercial users have become dependent on the platform itself. In other words, platform owners have started acting as rivals and de facto regulators between consumers and commercial users (sellers, advertisers, and more). In such a situation, abuse of the dominant position through exclusionary conduct, such as leveraging or self-preferencing, is more likely to happen.
