Commission’s Review Focuses on Cosmetics Rather Than Substance

BRUSSELS, BELGIUM – The Digital Markets Act (DMA) Review Report represents a missed opportunity to take stock of the DMA’s broader impact on the EU digital economy. The Commission’s report focuses on surface issues rather than conducting a thorough analysis of the impact, especially for startups and small and medium-sized enterprises (SME).

Commenting on the review, Mike Sax, founder and chairperson of the Association for Competitive Technology (ACT) said:

‘We are disappointed with the Commission’s conclusion that the “DMA remains fit for the purpose and does not need to be revised”. The Commission has restructured digital ecosystems in the name of competition but has not stopped to ask what those changes cost in terms of security, stability, and legal predictability. For SMEs and their customers, those are not abstract questions, they are the daily reality of running a business’.

ACT highlights several significant failings of the review:

  1. The report does not adequately address the uncertainty that DMA enforcement has generated across the wider ecosystem. Startups and SMEs rely on the services, trust, and consumer base that curated online marketplaces (COMs) provide. Those marketplaces are being significantly reshaped by DMA obligations, often with little clarity on what the new rules mean for SMEs’ own products, integrations, and business models. A credible simplification agenda must acknowledge and address this downstream burden, not just the compliance costs to the marketplaces themselves.
  2. The report is silent on the tension between DMA enforcement and the privacy and security of EU citizens and businesses. The Commission cites the growth of alternative app stores as an unqualified success but has not assessed the security implications for the SMEs and end users who rely on those platforms.
  3. The review methodology was hamstrung by tunnel vision. The concentration of DMA enforcement within a single unit, focused on competition at the top of the market, has meant that other values critical to startups and SMEs, including data security, consumer trust, and legal certainty, have not received adequate weight. The report offers no evidence that cross-regulatory coordination has translated into meaningful outcomes for SMEs navigating multiple overlapping regulatory frameworks simultaneously.

‘SMEs need digital markets that are not only fair and contestable, but also safe, predictable, and easy to operate in’, said Sax. ‘We therefore call on the Commission to complement this report with a more detailed assessment of the DMA’s full impact on the SME community, including the indirect costs of enforcement uncertainty, the security risks introduced by restructuring the ecosystem, and a stronger framework for ensuring that enforcement reflects the full range of values that SMEs depend on’.

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About Association for Competitive Technology (ACT)

ACT is a global technology trade association representing startups, scaleups, small and medium-sized enterprises (SME). We work directly with our members worldwide to advocate for a policy environment that takes into account their real-world challenges and supports innovation, access to capital, job creation, and the ability of small technology companies to grow and compete globally.