First Page
249
Abstract
Over the past decade, gatekeeper platforms, such as Amazon.com, Inc. (Amazon), have created highly monopolistic business models to benefit themselves while undermining third-party merchants on digital marketplaces. To illustrate, Amazon collects third-party merchant and consumer data on its marketplace to improve its private-label brands while simultaneously selling them alongside third-party merchant products, creating a significant conflict of interest business model. To address this anticompetitive behavior, the United States (U.S.) and the European Union (E.U.) have proposed contrasting approaches. The U.S., through the Ending Platform Monopolies Act, offers a structural separation remedy, giving the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission the statutory tools needed to sue and structurally split gatekeeper platforms that have conflict of interest business models. Contrastingly, the E.U., through the Digital Markets Act, proposes that gatekeeper platforms share their data with third-party merchants, allowing both parties to benefit while operating on a gatekeeper platform’s digital marketplace. Although strict and uncompromising, this Note proposes that the U.S. approach would be more effective in addressing the monopolistic behavior of gatekeeper platforms.
Recommended Citation
Peter R. Enia,
A Continental Rift? The United States and European Union's Contrasting Approaches to Regulating the Monopolistic Behavior of Gatekeeper Platforms,
16 Brook. J. Corp. Fin. & Com. L.
249
(2022).
Available at:
https://brooklynworks.brooklaw.edu/bjcfcl/vol16/iss2/7