Epic Games And Other Mobile App Companies Lobby For A North Dakota Bill To Control Big Tech Monopoly

Smaller mobile app companies, including Epic Games, have taken their fight against Apple and Google’s monopoly of in-app purchases to the North Dakota Senate with a proposed bill that, once passed, will level the playing field for app developers in the state.

According to The New York Times, a draft of the bill was submitted to North Dakota Republican state senator Kyle Davidson by Lacee Bjork Anderson, a lobbyist working with Odney Public Affairs in Bismarck.

Anderson said in an interview that she was hired by Epic Games and the Coalition for App Fairness, a group of companies which also included Epic along with Spotify and Match Group, the company behind Match, OKCupid, and Tinder. The bill is also gained the support of the Fargo Chamber of Commerce. On the other side of the fence is the Americans for Prosperity, a conservative group funded by the Koch family of Koch Industries, the second-largest privately-owned company in the United States.

Last week’s hearing on the bill drew a lot of attention with North Dakota newspapers, Silicon Valley executives, and Washington lawyers in attendance. “She said to me that this could be big. But to me, that means the local newspaper is going to come with a camera,” said Senator Davidson. “I would not be truthful if I said I expected the reaction.”

Erik Neuenschwander, Apple’s chief privacy engineer, testified during the hearing that the bill “threatens to destroy iPhone as you know it.” An Apple spokeswoman also maintained that most iPhone apps were free and weren’t subject to commission from in-app purchases.

The proposed bill is part of a collective movement by smaller companies to bring the fight against big tech companies to the state legislative department after being letdown time and time again by local courts, regulators, and the Congress. Several other bills have also been proposed in other states to tax big tech companies and prevent them from monopolizing the industry, including New York, Florida, and Maryland. Connecticut and Indiana are also looking to pass similar bills.

North Dakota’s senators have already started debating the new bill and will be voting on it this week.