Report from Kyodo News
In Brief – The Japan Fair Trade Commission, the country’s antitrust authority, has unveiled draft guidelines for the new law that will regulate how Google and Apple operate their smartphone app stores and compete with third-party app developers. The proposed guidelines for Japan’s Mobile Software Competition Act imposes new requirements including allowing third-party app stores, alternative payments options, the ability of users to choose their default apps, and prohibiting the operating system companies from preferencing their own apps. The prohibition on self-preferencing extends to how the digital giants use data related to the use of third-party apps as well. A public comment period is open until June 13, with finalized guidelines expected by the end of July, and the law goes into effect on December 18, 2025.
Context – Japan has pursued more moderate digital regulation than the EU and the UK in recent years, potentially because two of the five digital giants in Japan are Japanese companies. None of the original six digital “gatekeeper” companies under the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) was European and it’s unlikely that any UK-based companies will be designated as having “Strategic Market Status” under the Digital Markets Competition and Consumers Act (DMCCA). When Japan chose app store regulation as the digital market to use to join the European trend of regulating digital markets rather than sticking to traditional antitrust enforcement, they picked a market with just two digital giants, both not Japanese. And one where the regulatory tide is well underway elsewhere. The European Commission has rejected both Google’s and Apple’s app store rules, both companies will soon be regulated under the DMCCA, and in the US, federal judges are covering much the same ground in the federal antitrust cases filed by Epic. When asked about app store regulation in the context of tariff talks with the US Trump Administration, the JFTC Director said, “We don’t think this will be a big problem. It’s not like Japan is the only country that’s targeted certain US companies.”