The Federal Cartel Office has determined that Meta Platforms, Inc., Menlo Park, USA, is a company with outstanding cross-market importance for competition. This means that the instruments of expanded abuse supervision, which the German legislature introduced at the beginning of 2021, can be applied to Meta.
The new rules of Section 19a GWB allow the Federal Cartel Office to intervene earlier and more effectively against the behavior of large digital companies. The Federal Cartel Office can prohibit companies whose outstanding cross-market importance for competition it has determined from practices that endanger competition.
“The digital ecosystem created by Meta with a very large number of users makes the company the central player in the area of social media. According to our investigations, Meta is therefore a company of outstanding cross-market importance in terms of antitrust law. We have now formally established his position after a sometimes contentious process. Our findings enable us to take action against any competition violations much more efficiently than we were able to do with the instruments previously available. Meta has waived any right to appeal our decision.”
Andreas Mundt, President of the Federal Cartel Office
Meta is an internationally active digital company that is particularly known for its Facebook (including Messenger), Instagram and WhatsApp services. Meta is continually expanding its offering with features such as “Stories” or “Reels” and offers such as “Watch” or “Shops”. As a major future project, Meta is investing in hardware and software for a “Metaverse”, a comprehensive virtual 3D world. For this purpose, Meta, for example, bought the 3D glasses and technology manufacturer Oculus (now: Meta Quest).
Meta's services are used by over 3.5 billion people worldwide. Large parts of the population in Germany also use the meta services. Due to the large number of users and the data that Meta has about them, the company is also the leading provider in the area of social media advertising. The company has so far financed itself almost exclusively from this. In 2021, Meta's profits rose again by more than a third to almost USD 40 billion compared to the previous year.
Overall, Meta operates a strong, advertising-financed social media ecosystem that continues to expand.

Legal dispute with Meta still pending in court today
Due to competition concerns, the Federal Cartel Office banned Meta from merging user data from different sources at the beginning of 2019 ( see press release from February 7, 2019 ). However, the legal dispute with Meta regarding this decision is still pending before the courts today. In addition, the Federal Cartel Office has been conducting proceedings against Meta since 2020 for linking the 3D glasses offering from Meta Quest (formerly Oculus) to Facebook ( see press release from December 10, 2020 ).
With the determination of Meta's outstanding cross-market importance for competition in accordance with Section 19a Paragraph 1 GWB, the conditions have been created for such proceedings to be completed more quickly in the future.
In accordance with legal requirements, the decision is limited to five years after it becomes effective. During this time, Meta is subject to special abuse control by the Federal Cartel Office in accordance with Section 19a Paragraph 2 GWB.
Meta has declared that it will not lodge an appeal against the decision and will not dispute the addressee status within the meaning of Section 19a Paragraph 1 GWB. However, Meta does not expressly declare that it necessarily agrees with all of the factual findings made by the Decision Division in the decision and the conclusions drawn from them.
The Federal Cartel Office will soon publish a case report on its decision.
Background:
Since the beginning of 2021, with the 10th amendment to the ARC, new regulations in the area of abuse supervision have come into force, which allow the Federal Cartel Office to take action against large digital companies more quickly and effectively. The office has since initiated various new proceedings against Google, Amazon, Meta (formerly Facebook) and Apple. The office had already legally established the outstanding cross-market importance of Alphabet / Google at the end of 2021 ( see press release of January 5, 2022 ).
Source: Federal Cartel Office
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