Epic Games, based in Cary, North Carolina, is moving up to sue Google and Samsung, alleging that the two companies have maintained a close partnership for over a decade. Epic claims that Google has paid Samsung billions of dollars to promote the Google Play store over Samsung’s own Galaxy app store.
This legal battle is part of Epic's ongoing conflict with tech giants Google and Apple, which began in 2020. The dispute arose when Epic encouraged players of its popular game “Fortnite” to make direct purchases from them instead of using the payment systems offered by Google and Apple. In response, both companies removed the game from their app stores, prompting Epic to file antitrust lawsuits against them.
So far, Epic has seen mixed results in court. The company won its case against Google but faced significant losses in its case against Apple. In both lawsuits, Epic argued that these companies used their dominant positions in the app-store market to extract excessive profits from app developers. Google has announced plans to appeal the verdict from last year.
Both Google and Apple have been criticized for their app-store policies by regulators globally. Earlier this year, new legislation came into effect in the European Union, imposing regulations on how major tech companies operate within the app ecosystem and beyond. This new law allowed Epic to reintroduce “Fortnite” to iPhones in Europe in August.
Epic Games was founded by Tim Sweeney in 1991 when he was just 20 years old, starting from his parents’ basement with an investment of $4,000 in personal savings. Besides “Fortnite,” Epic is also renowned for creating the Unreal Engine, a popular suite of game-development tools. In 2022, the company raised $2 billion in funding, bringing its valuation to $31.5 billion, an increase from $29 billion the year before. Notable investors in Epic include Disney, Sony Group, and Tencent from China.
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