The time has come to speed up and toughen up the implementation of the Digital Markets Act (DMA), two years after the adoption of this legislation designed to promote competition in digital markets (cloud services, online messaging, browsers, applications, virtual marketplaces, etc.) often dominated by a handful of major players, most of them American. This is the main message that MEPs are preparing to send to the European Commission, according to a draft resolution due to be adopted on Thursday 30 April in Strasbourg.
Parliament “expresses its concern at the political pressure exerted by third countries urging the Union to review the [DMA] or to water it down, and stresses that such external interference must not compromise the Union’s sovereignty or its autonomy when it comes to defining and applying its own rules”, says the text, which will be put to a vote by MEPs.
In fact, the DMA and the DSA (Digital Services Act) are vilified by the Trump administration, which regularly calls on the Commission to spare the American digital giants. In recent months, various press articles have indicated that the Brussels institution was prepared to slow down some of its investigations, or even to moderate the amount of any fines imposed on Google, Meta, Apple and others, in order not to upset Washington.
The European Parliament’s draft resolution confines itself to “regret[ing] that the scope” of the first decisions “remains limited (...) and that the fines imposed are relatively modest compared to the scale of the infringements and the economic power of the designated gatekeepers”. This moderation “risks having an insufficient dissuasive effect and does not correspond to the ambition of the Act”, it is further noted.
“If these revelations are confirmed, they are unacceptable. I condemn the politicisation of digital issues at the Commission. It weakens us in the face of ‘Big Tech’, at the worst possible time”, criticised French Renew Europe MEP Stéphanie Yon-Courtin during a debate on the subject on Tuesday.
In the same vein, Pierre Jouvet (S&D, French) pointed to “procedures [that] drag on, fines postponed”, whereby the Commission is allowing the EU to become “a digital colony of the United States”.
Present at the debate, Commission Vice-President Teresa Ribera, who is responsible for implementing the DMA, categorically denied giving in to pressure from the Trump administration. “Don’t believe the rumours that are spreading (...) Don’t spread them. Stick to the facts. And if you have any questions about what we’re doing, I’m always available to answer or clarify”, she replied.
However, many MEPs pointed to the slowness of the Commission’s procedures and the lack of resources within its ranks to implement the DMA effectively, echoing the content of the draft resolution. It calls on the institution “to allocate sufficient human and financial resources to the enforcement of the Digital Markets Act, in line with its scope, complexity and strategic importance (...) and calls for a significant increase in staffing levels”.
“Decisions are too slow and the Commission does not have enough staff”, said Italian Social Democrat Brando Benifei, for example, although he felt that the Commission’s action was moving in “the right direction”.
“Some people think we’re moving too slowly, and I can understand that argument. However, even though we are in the digital age, time is of the essence: we want to take decisions that are effective, but also legally sound, particularly in the event that some of them are challenged in the courts”, was the defence from Teresa Ribera. “It’s in our DNA: respect for the rule of law (...)”, the Spanish Socialist went on to say, while acknowledging that “of course we need significant resources”.
Another major topic for resolution is the accelerating emergence of generative AI systems and other virtual assistants, and the associated cloud services. In the eyes of the MEPs, these developments give cause for “concern”, with new risks of “dependency in certain market segments”, and therefore new challenges for the DMA. At this stage, however, “no cloud service provider has been designated as a gatekeeper under the Act”, MEPs regret in the draft text. An investigation was launched in November 2025 to determine whether Amazon and Microsoft should be designated as “gatekeepers” for their cloud services.
In the Commission’s view, these technological developments do not call for any changes to the content of the Act at this stage. It has been designed to remain relevant and “future-proof”, Teresa Ribeira said, referring to the next review of the DMA in 2029.
At the same time, on Wednesday the Commission published its first-ever “review” of the DMA, concluding that the Act remained “fit for purpose” and praising its initial “positive effects” for consumers on digital markets. (Original version in French by Clément Solal)