The US-EU partnership is fundamental for Europe’s businesses and prosperity. The US remains the EU’s largest trade and investment partner. Their bilateral relationship accounts for 40% of global trade in goods and service, with a total trade value in goods of 556 billion euros[1].

When it comes to digital services, however, the relationship is less balanced. US companies have taken the majority of the Business-to-Consumer (B2C) market share for many digital services in Europe, such as online search, social media, operating systems, web browsers[2]. While there are 1.2 million digital companies in the EU[3], including over 10,000 digital platforms[4], the majority of platforms used by EU citizens on a daily basis are US-based. The ten most valuable digital companies in the world are either US-American or Asian[5].

Against this background, DIGITAL SME welcomes the creation of the EU-US Trade and Technology Council (TTC) but wants to enter a note of caution: The digitalisation of SMEs (“Promoting SME access to and use of digital technologies”) should not be seen as a one-way street. Digital technologies should not be reduced to technologies provided by the likes of the large platforms. Data-intelligence, platform business models, selling online, and other forms of SME digitalisation can happen both with the dominant digital players, but also without them.

SMEs and citizens need open and contestable digital markets that allow them to choose the digitalisation path that is best for them.

[1] European Commission DG Trade website, Countries and regions: United States, 2021, available at: https://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/countries-and-regions/countries/united-states/; Trade volume according to Eurostat, see: https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/isdb_results/factsheets/country/details_usa_en.pdf

[2] European Commission, Digital Markets Act Impact Assessment support study, 2020, pp. 23-25, available at: https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/2a69fd2a-3e8a-11eb-b27b-01aa75ed71a1/language-en

[3] European Commission, Annual Single Market Report, 2021

[4]https://ec.europa.eu/info/strategy/priorities-2019-2024/europe-fit-digi…

[5]https://www.investopedia.com/articles/markets/030816/worlds-top-10-tech…