EU Antitrust Raiders Are Going After Tech for Competition Regulation

On a Tuesday in July, European Union antitrust regulators showed up in the lobby of Orange SA’s offices on the edge of Paris armed with laptops and a search warrant.

Stephane Richard, the chief executive officer of France’s largest phone company, was quickly forced to hand over his iPhone as the EU’s antitrust enforcement arm hunted for evidence that Orange was abusing its dominant position in the Internet connectivity market.

“They have their methods,” Richard said as he recalled the confiscationDeutsche Telekom AG CEO Rene Obermann and Cesar Alierta, his counterpart at Telefonica SA, also had their mobile phones snatched away during simultaneous July 9 raids by the EU, Richard said in an interview at a Brussels conference last week. Read more...