By Nandita Bose and Diane Bartz
(Reuters) – A U.S. House of Representatives panel looking into abuses of market power by four of the biggest technology companies found they used “killer acquisitions” to smite rivals, charged exorbitant fees, and forced small businesses into “oppressive” contracts in the name of profit.
The scathing 449-page report describes dozens of instances where Alphabet Inc’s <GOOGL.O> Google, Apple Inc <AAPL.O>, Amazon.com <AMZN.O> and Facebook <FB.O> misused their power, revealing corporate cultures apparently bent on doing what they could to hold on to their dominance over large portions of the internet.
“To put it simply, companies that once were scrappy, underdog startups that challenged the status quo have become the kinds of monopolies we last saw in the era of oil barons and railroad tycoons,” the report said.
After more than a year of investigation involving 1.3 million documents and more than 300 interviews, the committee led by Democratic Congressman David Cicilline found companies running marketplaces where they also competed, creating “a position that enables them to write one set of rules for others, while they play by another.”
(Reporting by Nandita Bose and Diane Bartz; Editing by Edward Tobin and Leslie Adler)
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