Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney Calls Apple's App Store a 'Disservice to Developers'

Apple's App Store has helped app makers earn over $260 billion since it was launched, but it has forced them to treat their apps as sub-par.

In an exclusive interview with the Financial Times, Sweeney repeated his previous talking points about Apple and how it is anti-competitive.

The problem here is a classic monopoly tie. You start with hardware. Apple make smartphones and they profit from their smartphones — and they deserve to. But then they force all buyers of their smartphones to use their app store exclusively for obtaining digital content. They prevent all other app stores from competing with them on hardware that's owned by a billion end users. That's the first tie and that completely obstructs all competition and market forces that would shape better app stores and better deals for consumers.

Apple gains an unfair advantage over competitors and other markets by using its fair advantage in hardware. The tech industry was healthy in the past because of competitive dynamics.

Despite Apple's attempt to market it as a service, Sweeney criticized it as a platform itself. The app store is not helpful to developers. The CEO ofEpic Games said that the app store forces developers to treat their software in a sub-par way to give customers a sub-par experience to charge uncompetitive handling and processing fees to inflate the price of digital goods.

Since its launch, the App Store has helped developers earn over $260 billion and has fostered aniOS app economy that has created over 2.2 million jobs in the U.S.

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