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Antitrust regulators in the European Union are now investigating the broad grand tech coalition controlling the AV1 video codec standard, citing concerns about anticompetitive behavior.
The Alliance for Open Media (AOM) was formed in 2015 to find a suitable video format that would conform to W3C and HTML5 standards. It co-developed the AV1 standard, an open video codec created as a royalty-free alternative to HEVC.
AV1 is seen as a better technical alternative to many video formats because it offers better compression and thus uses less bandwidth and storage space.
The 14 ruling members of AOM are Google, Facebook, Intel, Microsoft, Netflix, Nvidia, Samsung and many others including Apple, who joined in 2018† There are 41 general members, including Adobe, AMD, Alibaba, the BBC, Hulu, VideoLan, Vimeo, and more.
Now the European Union is investigating alleged anti-competitive behavior regarding AV1 licensing terms by AOM and its members in Europe. The watchdog group sent a questionnaire, seen by Reutersto involved companies.
“The Commission has information that AOM and its members may impose licensing terms (mandatory royalty-free cross-licensing) on innovators who were not part of AOM at the time of the AV1 technology’s creation, but whose patents are considered essential to (its) technical specifications “, read the questionnaire.
The group is concerned that AOM could limit innovators’ ability to compete with AV1. The EU claims that if true, it removes incentives for innovation.
The companies involved can be fined up to 10% of their worldwide turnover for violating EU rules. No timetable for the investigation has been announced.