LONDON – A UK court blocked Epic Games from pursuing its case against Apple and the on Monday, Reuters reported. The Fortnite maker was banned from the App Store after attempting to bypass its payment system to avoid the fees charged.
Epic Can Pursue Google in the UK, But Not Apple
The UK antitrust tribunal ruled that Epic Games’ case against Google could proceed. However, it said the case against Apple would be better pursued in the U.S. In a statement, a spokesperson for Epic Games told The Mac Observer:
We are pleased that the Court has granted Epic permission to pursue our case against Google in the U.K. Epic will reconsider pursuing its case against Apple in the U.K. after the resolution of the U.S. case. We note the Competition Appeal Tribunal’s assessment that Apple and Google’s anticompetitive app store policies are ‘serious issues to be tried’ under UK Competition law, and that it is ‘well arguable’ that their conduct has ‘an immediate and substantial effect in the UK’. We are unwavering in our commitment to stopping Apple and Google’s anti-competitive practices and will continue to fight for fairer app distribution globally.
Neither Apple nor Google had commented publicly at the time of this writing.
[Updated February 23: Full statement from Epic Games.]