Digital Markets Act: Partial success for Metamorphology before the EU court

Metamorphology has achieved a partial success in the EU rules for digital platforms. On Wednesday, the Court of Justice of the European Union (EuG) declared a decision by the EU Commission partially void. In September 2023, the Brussels competition guards classified the Facebook butter group on the basis of the Digital Markets Act (DMA) as so-called goalkeepers. This classification tipped EuG for the in-house classified service Marketplace. For the Messenger communication service, they remain in opposition.

Meta was against both names. The platform operator does not consider the affected services as an independent, critical access store for business customers.

In its explanatory statement to repeal the marketplace status, the court did not spare it with criticism of the Commission. The Luxembourg judges accused her of a legal error. In its assessment, it was based stubbornly on data from the last three years prior to the designation, ignoring significant regulatory and actual changes that Meta had introduced at the end of July 2023. A US group spokesman accordingly welcomed the verdict: the decision confirms that the marketplace must not be named from the outset.

failed analysis and lack of justification

The EuG points out that the legality of an EU act must always be assessed on the basis of the actual circumstances at the time of its adoption. This is precisely where the Commission has failed, as it has not submitted a concrete analysis of the changes made by Meta, nor has it explained their impact on the classification as an online conciliation service. In order to be considered as such, a service must enable companies to provide consumers directly with products or services. The Commission’s arguments in the decision remained purely hypothetical and incomplete on this point, according to the decision.

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In practice, however, the judgment in Case T-1078/23 has only symbolic significance for the marketplace's operating business. The Commission officially opened the Gatekeeper Classification for the Classified Service in April 2025. Meta had previously implemented additional monitoring tools to prevent commercial use by companies. These measures led to a decrease in the number of active business customers in the EU to below 10,000. This is far below the DMA threshold.

Messenger stays targeted

The method for meta was not successful, however, with a view to the messenger. The judges hereby fully endorsed the Commission's view and rejected the operator's arguments. They found that the messenger is an interpersonal communication service that is separate from the social network Facebook and is independent of numbers. Meta had argued that the services were deeply integrated. However, the EuG pointed out that the messenger can be offered via independent apps and used independently of Facebook. In addition, the Group promotes specific tools that allow companies to directly contact users.

Also the objection of metas, the Commission incorrectly calculated the number of users, did not allow the court to apply. In order to determine whether the quantitative thresholds of the DMA are reached, Brussels officials were correctly allowed to use all end users and not only had to count those who use the messenger exclusively without a Facebook account. Since Meta was unable to provide sufficient arguments to alleviate the legal assumptions of DMA, the Commission was not obliged to carry out a specific market investigation.

Meta announced to examine the options for a complaint against this part of the judgment at the European Court of Justice. In 2025, the EU already imposed a fine of 200 million euros against meta for breaches of competition. The company also defends itself in court.

(mho)