Doing Business in a World of Goliaths: Power Imbalances and Economic Dependency in Platform-to-Business Relations

Doing Business in a World of Goliaths: Power Imbalances and Economic Dependency in Platform-to-Business Relations Digital platforms have emerged as crucial infrastructures in today’s economy, facilitating digital transactions between buyers and sellers. However, propelled by network effects and other sources of market power, digital platforms are generally the stronger party in their relations with users, and this could lead them to abuse their market power through exclusionary and exploitative practices. While extensive consumer regulations shield consumers in business-to-consumer (B2C) transactions, scant protection is afforded to businesses in presumed peer-to-peer business-to-business (B2B) transactions. Although certain EU provisions, such as Article 102 TFEU, Regulation 1150/2019 and the Digital Markets Act (DMA), aim to safeguard business users in platform-to-business (P2B) contexts, their effectiveness is constrained. These regulations and provisions are often too narrow in scope, fail to consider the platform’s unique features, prioritise public interests over those of individual businesses and lack effective remedies. Conversely, some Member States have adopted abuse of economic dependence regulations, potentially offering stronger protection, as such an approach provides more flexibility and emphasises contractual fairness for individual business users. The present article attempts to show that business users are in fact economically dependent on the platform, thereby suggesting that an EU level prohibition of abuse of economic dependence could more effectively address the existing gaps in protection.