BRUSSELS: A lobby group representing airlines, hotels and retailers has urged Google to take into account the views of the European Union's tech regulator, and not just big intermediaries, as it makes changes to comply with landmark tech rules.
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The European Airlines Group, whose members include Air France-KLM and British Airways parent IAG, hotel group Hotrec, the European Hotel Forum, Eurocommerce, E-Commerce Europe and Independent Retail Europe all expressed concerns in March about the impact of the new rules.
The EU's Digital Markets Act (DMA) imposes a list of dos and don'ts on Google and five other tech giants, aimed at giving users more choice and giving rivals a fighting chance, but the groups have expressed concern that the adjustments could have a negative impact on their bottom lines.
In a joint letter dated May 22 to EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager and EU industry chief Thierry Breton, they said their concerns have grown since then.
“Our industry has serious concerns that the solutions and requirements currently being considered for DMA implementation could lead to further discrimination,” they wrote.
“Early observations suggest that these changes risk significantly reducing companies' direct sales revenues as powerful online intermediaries gain importance by receiving preferential treatment,” they said.
The European Commission is currently investigating Google for possible violations of the DMA, but did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Google said in a blog post in March that the changes to its search results would increase traffic for large intermediaries and aggregators and decrease traffic for hotels, airlines, retailers and restaurants, but had no immediate comment.
“We are concerned that the breach investigation only refers to the need to treat third-party services fairly and without discrimination, and makes no mention of European companies that provide services through Google,” the groups said.