What You Need To Know About Apple's New Legal Fight Over India's Antitrust Fine Apple says that the country should impose a penalty on the basis of the India revenue of a specific unit that has breached the antitrust law.

Apple is starting a new legal battle against India's competition watchdog over a new antitrust law that seeks penalties based on a company's global turnover.

The iPhone-maker earlier this week moved the Delhi High Court against the new law by the Competition Commission of India (CCI), Reuters reports. Apple argues that 10% of the average global turnover from its services operating globally in the fiscal year to 2024 is about USD 38 billion and that such a "penalty based on global turnover...would be manifestly arbitrary, unconstitutional, grossly disproportionate, unjust", the report added citing a 545-page court filing.

Entrepreneur India has reached out to Apple for more details.

Heart of the matter

The case stems from a complaint filed by the Tinder-parent firm Match Group and many other Indian startups in 2022.

It was alleged that Apple is forcing developers to use its own payment processing system for in-app purchases, which are liable for a fee to the company. Developers have also alleged that the commissions levied by Apple were high (up to 30%). Apple is also accused of discouraging developers from providing links or any other button to allow users to pay for the in-app purchases through alternative ways.

According to reports, India's watchdog has found Apple guilty of practising "abusive conduct" by restricting developers' choice and building a monopoly position.

"Apple App Store is an unavoidable trading partner for app developers, and resultantly, app developers have no choice but to adhere to Apple's unfair terms, including the mandatory use of Apple's proprietary billing and payment system," the CCI noted in a report released in June 2024.

Apple, however, turned down the allegations stating it was a relatively smaller player compared to rival Google.

According to Counterpoint Research's quarterly monthly smartphone tracker, Apple was among the top five smartphone companies in India but with less than 10% market share as of Q3 2025. Though, Apple recorded its highest-ever Q3 shipments in the market. Moreover, Apple's sales have continued to increase in the country over the years. It also enjoys market dominance in the premium smartphone segment. In Q3 2025, Apple held a 28 percent value share.

Bone of Contention

Apple's pain point is likely the amended law that seeks penalty on the global turnover, which in this case is estimated to be USD 38 billion. According to the Reuters report cited above, Apple says that the country should impose a penalty on the basis of the India revenue of a specific unit that has breached the antitrust law.

In 2024, the Indian government issued monetary penalty guidelines read with section 27(b) of competition commission of India (Amendment) Act 2023.

According to the amendment, in case a company after inquiry is found in abuse of dominant position, the competition commission can impose a maximum penalty of 10% of the turnover of preceding three financial years. This can also be read as the worldwide turnover as per the explanation in the section.

The amendment says:

"In section 27 of the principal Act, for clause (b), the following clause shall be

substituted, namely:—

'(b) impose such penalty, as it may deem fit which shall be not more than ten

per cent. of the average of the turnover or income, as the case may be, for the last three

preceding financial years, upon each of such person or enterprise which is a party to

such agreement or has abused its dominant position:

Provided that in case any agreement referred to in section 3 has been entered

into by a cartel, the Commission may impose upon each producer, seller, distributor,

trader or service provider included in that cartel, a penalty of up to three times of its

profit for each year of the continuance of such agreement or ten per cent. of its

turnover or income, as the case may be, for each year of the continuance of such

agreement, whichever is higher.

Explanation 1.—For the purposes of this clause, the expression "turnover" or

"income", as the case may be, shall be determined in such manner as may be specified

by regulations.

Explanation 2.—For the purposes of this clause, "turnover" means global

turnover derived from all the products and services by a person or an enterprise.'."

Apple in its filing highlighted the CCI's use of the new rules for the first time on November 10 in an unrelated case wherein the watchdog had penalised a company retrospectively over a violation by the affected company by decade earlier, according to the Reuters report.

Apple added that it had "no choice but to bring this constitutional challenge now to avoid retrospective imposition of penalty against them.".

Mishi Choudhary, founder at SFLC.in, told Entrepreneur India using rules retrospectively makes the country a "very unattractive jurisdiction for any serious business."

"Moreover, India presents as a high risk regulatory environment where regulatory bodies change rules uncertainly reducing appetite for investment. Retroactively applying harsher penalties is unconstitutional and violates due process," she noted.

"This is not to say that we don't want CCI or other regulators to check abusive behavior by companies. We want the regulators to curb such walled garden behavior of Apple but while staying true to antitrust principles," she said.

Not the first time

Even as Apple has come under the CCI scanner, the competition watchdog has issued multiple rulings against Google for abusing its dominant position. Google was slapped with a fine of INR INR 1337.76 crore (around USD 1.6 billion) but was reduced to INR 216 crore (around USD 26 million) by the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT).

Outside India, both Apple and Google have been involved in numerous legal tussles globally with developers. One of the most notable cases has been Epic Games vs Apple.

The dispute emerged in 2020 when Epic Games found its Fortnite game was booted out of the Apple App Store over alleged violation of rules. Epic Games had introduced a direct payment option in Fortnite that bypassed Apple's payment system as it did not intend to pay a steep 30% commission on in-app purchases. The move saw several developers coming out in support of Epic Games and calling Apple's move unjust. The incident also brought Apple's App Store monetisation model to fore. After nearly five years of legal tussle, the two parties settled the case earlier this year.

"The case with Epic Games was important for a lot of reasons. It brought an important conversation to the spotlight and helped something similar to happen in India. If you remember, Paytm was among the first ones to call out Google's app store practices. This is far from over at the moment as these large tech companies are unlikely to give up their foothold so easily and may continue devising new mechanisms to make money," a Mumbai-based senior investor told Entrepreneur India.

That said, Google has made amendments to its app store policies. For instance, it allows developers to offer the choice of an alternative billing system, such as credit card, PayPal, or their own payment system, instead of or in addition to Google Play's billing. Moreover, it has reduced commissions in certain regions, such as India, by 4%.

Despite these arguments, it is highly unlikely that the Indian government will roll back the global turnover clause. Moreover, the prevailing sentiment is against the dominance of global entities in India. The proceedings and the final verdict of this case will have an impact on both Indian startups and Apple. The petition is scheduled to be heard by the Delhi High Court on December 3.

Choudhary notes that the CCI and India must exercise its powers to show India is serious about its regulations, not just another local market. She, however, also adds a caveat on enforcing these rules.

"Having said that, this seems an over reach. Competition law cases are market specific. Penalties should be based on the turnover of the relevant market. This is standard globally. If the "relevant market" is only India's iOS app distribution, the penalty should be calculated based on that turnover, not Apple's global hardware + services revenue," she told Entrepreneur India.

Abhishek Anthwal, senior advocate at High Court of Uttarakhand, says the action by the government reflects the seriousness regarding the anti-competitive agreements being executed by the dominant players and their abuse of dominant position.

"The action of the government would nudge these giants to make their platform more democratic and competitive. However the CCI needs to act more strongly against anti-competitive acquisition to make the ultimate purpose of the new amendment successful," he added.