Tim Sweeney, the founder and CEO of Epic Games, has sharply criticized the heads of large tech companies, accusing them of trying to please US President-elect Donald Trump and "pretending to be Republicans" to avoid antitrust controls and strengthen their market dominance, PCGamer reports.
In a post on the X platform (formerly Twitter), Sweeney said that the heads of tech giants are changing their political preferences to support the new administration.
“After years of pretending to be Democrats, Big Tech leaders are now pretending to be Republicans, in hopes of currying favor with the new administration. Beware of the scummy monopoly campaign to vilify competition law as they rip off consumers and crush competitors,” Sweeney wrote.
Among the tech companies that made significant donations to Trump's inauguration were Google, Apple, Amazon, and Meta. Google and Apple donated $1 million each, with Apple CEO Tim Cook reportedly making a personal contribution. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg also attracted public attention by loosening Facebook's content moderation policy, which many see as an attempt to please the Trump administration.
NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang recently praised Trump's election victory, saying that he would like to personally congratulate the president-elect and that his company will do everything possible to support the success of the new administration. However, so far, NVIDIA has not announced any donations to Trump's inauguration.
Sweeney's statement fits in with his communication over the past few years, as Epic Games is still fighting Apple and Google over their app store policies, which require developers to use the companies' official payment systems and pay commissions. Epic accuses both companies of monopolizing the mobile software market as they make it difficult for third-party developers to reach users.
In 2020, Epic filed lawsuits against Apple and Google after the popular Fortnite game was removed from their stores for introducing a direct payment option that bypassed the companies' commissions. Sweeney has already stated that he will continue the fight until the "final victory" over what he calls "a completely false vision of the world" on the part of Apple and Google.
Sweeney's comments come amid fears that the Trump administration may ease antitrust regulation. Although Skadden noted that "aggressive antitrust regulation is unlikely to disappear entirely," experts predict that the new administration will be less strict in this regard compared to the Biden administration.
The head of the US Federal Trade Commission, Lina Khan, who is leading antitrust investigations against the tech giants, said this week that she hopes Amazon and Meta will not receive "lenient deals" in future litigation.
However, given the significant donations made by tech companies to Trump's inauguration and their public support for the new administration, critics such as Sweeney fear that these contributions could influence future regulatory decisions.
Trump himself recognized the change in the attitude of tech giants toward him. "In the first term, everyone was fighting me," said the newly elected president in December. "In this term, everybody wants to be my friend."