Sydney Morning Herald has the latest chapter in the ongoing saga of the court battle between Epic Games and Apple over Fortnite royalties in the App Store, whether Apple has a monopoly and all that jazz (thanks GamesIndustry.biz). The new action sees Epic stating the situation represents a violation of Australian consumer law:

Epic has long complained that the 30 per cent cut Apple takes on all payments made through its platform is too high. In August Fortnite, which brought in revenues of $US1.8 billion ($2.5 billion) in 2019, was removed from Apple's iPhone App Store when Epic insisted on including its own direct payment option at a 20 per cent discount. Epic subsequently sued Apple in California.

Now in its Australian filing, Epic claims Apple is breaching Australian consumer law by preventing competition in its iPhone ecosystem for payment processing and app downloads.

Sharemarket analysts view the legal dispute as an important test case for Apple's services and digital payments revenue, which have become an important driver of the $US2 trillion ($2.7 trillion) company's business.

Epic CEO Tim Sweeney told The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age that while smartphone app stores were a novelty 12 years ago, and a 70 per cent take was a good deal for developers, a huge chunk of the world's economy would soon be processed through mobile platforms and change was sorely needed.

"Apple has said they have the legal right to do whatever the hell they want because they make the devices. Under Apple's legal theory they could charge 90 per cent. The very notion that they're standing on is antithetical to free markets and competition," he said.