Tile, Apple AirTags, and antitrust allegations, briefly explained

On Tuesday, Apple announced the release of AirTag, a small, electronic tracker that people can attach to keys, a piece of luggage, or whatever, and then use Apple’s Find My system to find that item. For Apple fans, it is another useful product. But for Tile, the maker of a similar tracker, the long-awaited announcement is another sign of Apple’s anti-competitive behavior.

Tile is again encouraging Congress to take a closer look at Apple ahead of a Senate antitrust hearing, where Tile’s general counsel, Kirsten Daru, will testify alongside executives from Spotify, Match, Google and Apple. The hearing comes because Apple has repeatedly been accused of anti-competitive behavior over the requirement that all iOS apps be distributed through Apple’s App Store, where Apple charges a commission for the sale.

But in the case of the new AirTags, the criticism continues. Tile says that in addition to making hardware similar to his, Apple designs Apple software in a way that favors its own products and adversely affects Tile’s products.

“We welcome competition as long as it is fair competition,” said CJ Prober, CEO of Tile, in a statement shortly after Apple announced AirTag. “Given Apple’s well-documented history of using its platform advantage to unfairly restrict competition for its products, we are unfortunately skeptical.”

Apple AirTags, which go on sale in late April, do what Tile’s products have been doing for a while: keep track of things. The new trackers use Bluetooth technology to locate these lost items. AirTags also feature the U1 chip, which uses ultra-wideband technology for more accurate object location. This approach – and even the physical design of the trackers – is very similar to what Tile has been doing for years. Tile also uses Bluetooth to locate objects, and the company is in the process of launching ultra-wideband capabilities (along with an augmented reality feature) on its trackers.

A big difference between the new AirTags and Tile trackers: Tile relies on Apple to keep its location tracking tools running smoothly in the Apple App Store and iOS, but not the other way around. Tile has long argued that Apple unfairly designed its mobile operating system, iOS, and the Find My app to favor its own location tracking tools. Tile did not respond to Recode’s request for comment ahead of Wednesday’s hearing.

Apple, for its part, has resisted this criticism.

“Apple founded Find My more than a decade ago to help users locate and manage lost devices privately and securely,” the company told Recode in a statement. “We’ve always embraced competition as the best way to create great experiences for our customers, and we’ve worked hard to build a platform in iOS that allows third-party developers to thrive.”

The distance between Apple and Tile has been in the works for years. In 2019, rumors circulated that Apple was working on a tracker system that would compete with Tile’s products. Daru, Tile’s general counsel, told Congress last January that Apple made it more difficult for users to connect their iPhone to Tile devices by requiring permissions in iOS 13.5 that were hidden in the settings, and asking users for those permissions. after the devices were set up. Daru also claimed that Apple’s Find My app competed with Tile’s own app. Tile sent a letter to European authorities accusing Apple of anti-competitive behavior, saying that iOS 13.5 was built to favor Apple’s Find My app over Tile’s app, among other complaints. Apple “firmly” denied the allegations.

Following the salvo of attorney letters, Apple announced last summer that it would launch a new program that allows third-party trackers to work with the Find My app. But it wasn’t until early April of this year – two weeks before the launch of AirTags – that Apple finally updated the Find My app to work with third-party devices.

It is not clear how legislators or regulators will respond to this update. However, the argument that Apple is falsely pushing users to the Find My system instead of Tile’s system has garnered attention in Congress in the past. A comprehensive House antitrust report last October claimed that “Apple’s service requires companies like Tile to abandon their apps and be able to differentiate their service from Apple and other competitors” and that companies like Tile are “at a competitive disadvantage.” .

Ahead of Wednesday’s hearing, Senator Amy Klobuchar called Apple’s AirTags announcement “topical,” telling Reuters that “this is the kind of behavior we’ll be talking about at the hearing.”

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