Margrethe Vestager on Sept. 10 in Brussels. Photo: Thierry Monasse/Getty Images
Outgoing EU competition chief Margrethe Vestager told Axios she wishes she'd been "bolder" on tech antitrust cases during her decade of regulatory work.
The big picture: Vestager's mission of going after Big Tech companies for antitrust and other legal violations in Europe set off a trend of American regulators trying, only sometimes successfully, to do the same.
- She also played a key role in pushing forward the EU's AI Act, which critics on Capitol Hill and in Silicon Valley have said could stifle innovation.
Vestager sat down with Axios reporters on Monday during a trip to Washington to meet with some of her competition counterparts, including DOJ antitrust chief Jonathan Kanter and FTC commissioner Rebecca Slaughter.
- "I just wish that we had been bolder. When I was on the Hill for the first time 10 years ago, with the first Google case that I picked up, people said, 'What is this crazy woman doing? This is unthinkable, you cannot have a case against Google.'"
- "And now, you know, everyone is having cases against Google. The world has changed, and it's how they look at technology. So that's a really healthy development."
Friction point: The low parts of her reign? Losing.
- "I hate losing court cases."
- "You need to take risks once in a while, and it can happen, but knowing it and doing it are two completely different things."
Driving the news: Vestager's time as an EU official is up at the end of October. She will be heading back to Denmark full-time as chair of the board of governors for the Technical University of Denmark.
- Vestager just notched two big wins on her way out of Brussels, where she has been competition chief since 2014.
- Apple's preferable tax deal in Ireland was overturned, and an EU top court dismissed Google's appeal of a $2.6 billion fine from 2017 over its shopping service.
Other key points from Axios' discussion with Vestager:
- On whether FTC chair Lina Khan has been successful: "I don't think it's for me to judge. I have lost cases, too; if you do not lose cases, I think you're too risk-averse."
- Her response to Republican criticism on Capitol Hill that the AI Act goes too far: "We don't want to be China, and we agree with U.S. partners in our approach."
- How two signature pieces of legislation, the Digital Markets Act and the Digital Services Act, will prove effective: "They need to be implemented in full, and they need to be enforced ... and there's no such thing as a slam dunk. It's always complex."
- Apple has been uniquely difficult to work with when it comes to implementing the DMA, she said: "We haven't had as many grievances with other companies."
The bottom line: Vestager said her biggest takeaway from her time as antitrust chief is that individual cases against companies take too much time, and legislation is the best solution.
- "Speed is of the essence. Digital markets live and die much faster than conventional markets."
