Asia Tech Wire (July 17) -- The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) on Wednesday rejected an appeal by Chinese technology company ByteDance against an EU decision on "gatekeeper" status.

The European Commission first designated six companies - Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, ByteDance, Meta, and Microsoft - as "gatekeepers" under the Digital Markets Act (DMA) last September, involving 22 core platform services they provide.

The DMA imposes obligations on large online platforms, which must allow business users to access the data they generate on their platforms, allow them to promote their products, and transact with customers outside their platforms.

"Gatekeeper" companies are those that provide core platform services such as social networks, search engines, etc., and have a market capitalization of at least €75 billion or an annual turnover of €7.5 billion, as well as at least 45 million end-users per month in the EU and 10,000 business users per year.

If the companies in question violate the DMA, they face fines of up to 10% of their global annual turnover for the previous financial year and up to 20% for repeat offenses.

Last year, ByteDance, Apple and Meta appealed against their designation as "gatekeepers" by the EU.