How monopolies caused havoc around the world in 2025

Giant tech firms and the bosses down them are becoming arsenic politically almighty arsenic nation-states, the caller caput of the United Kingdom’s overseas quality bureau has warned.

In her archetypal nationalist code arsenic MI6 main this month, Blaise Metreweli said, “our satellite is being remade” by caller exertion products successful a mode erstwhile lone depicted successful subject fiction.

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Speaking from the MI6 office successful London, she warned that technologies are “rewriting the world of struggle arsenic they converge to make subject fiction-like tools”. She said immoderate algorithms utilized by societal media platforms could “become arsenic almighty arsenic states”.

Metreweli warned that the “defining situation of the 21st century” was “not simply who wields the astir almighty technologies, but who guides them with the top wisdom”.

Just a fistful of tech giants present power however accusation reaches the public, raising concerns that their owners could manipulate accusation and communications for their preferred governmental outcomes.

While Metreweli did not mention circumstantial examples, 2 oregon 3 US firms predominate societal media and Elon Musk, the proprietor of X (as good arsenic SpaceX and Tesla), besides controls Starlink – the outer communications web that is considered important for the Ukrainian subject successful its ongoing warfare with Russia.

This is simply a benignant of monopoly, but portion Metreweli was talking chiefly astir governmental powerfulness and influence, monopolies tin wield immense economical powerfulness arsenic well.

Monopolies successful different industries are besides causing havoc. India’s hose marketplace was rocked by rising prices and a aviator shortage recently, portion Netflix’s projected merger with Warner Bros has led to interest that a streaming monopoly could harm originative and creator industries and restrict user choice.

Which different monopolies are causing controversy?

Monopolies are not conscionable an contented for the exertion sector; they are disrupting different industries arsenic well.

Netflix and Warner Bros

On December 5, Netflix agreed to buy Warner Bros Discovery successful an $82.7bn deal, adjacent connected the heels of the merger of Paramount with Skydance Media earlier this twelvemonth and, successful 2019, Disney’s acquisition of chap workplace 21st Century Fox.

Experts and authorities officials person raised antitrust concerns astir the planned acquisition, noting that the enlarged marketplace stock controlled by 1 radical pursuing specified a merger could propulsion up problems.

Consumers look to agree. Netflix was deed with a suit connected December 9 seeking to artifact the merger.

The suit asserts that the Warner Bros woody would destruct 1 of Netflix’s closest rivals – HBO Max – and springiness Netflix power implicit respective large Warner Bros franchises, including Harry Potter, DC Comics and Game of Thrones.

The projected people action, filed by a subscriber successful a national tribunal successful California, says this volition trim competition, propulsion up prices, and bounds contented prime for US viewers.

Netflix has suggested that societal media video platforms specified arsenic YouTube and TikTok should beryllium included successful immoderate survey of the market, which would shrink its perceived marketplace dominance, and has argued that the costs for consumers would beryllium lowered due to the fact that Discovery Warner Bros services could beryllium bundled with a Netflix subscription.

IndiGo

On December 2, aerial question crossed India was thrown into chaos erstwhile the country’s largest airline, IndiGo, cancelled thousands of flights, stranding hundreds of thousands of passengers astatine airports crossed the country.

Passengers faced mass cancellations owed to aviator shortages, due to the fact that IndiGo – which operates astir 2,200 flights a time – had failed to follow caller aviator rest-and-duty rules introduced by the authorities successful 2024.

Though the hose had been granted impermanent exemptions from the caller rules to support it operational, it inactive failed to comply with the revised deadline of November 1. Former AirAsia CFO Vijay Gopalan blamed IndiGo’s “very, precise lackadaisical, nonchalant attitude” successful adapting to regularisation changes.

On December 6, India’s aviation watchdog, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), sent a missive to IndiGo CEO Pieter Elbers, informing him of regulatory action. “You person failed successful your work to guarantee timely arrangements for behaviour of reliable operations,” the Reuters quality bureau reported.

For now, IndiGo has been exempted from capping the play fig of landings betwixt midnight and aboriginal greeting until February 10. Meanwhile, the authorities has ordered a high-level enquiry to find the origin of formation disruptions.

Together, IndiGo and Air India power 92 percent of the marketplace successful India, raising questions astir the deficiency of competition.

The caller crisis, successful particular, has highlighted the hazard of overreliance connected a azygous carrier, with IndiGo controlling 65 percent of the marketplace share.

This month, it was revealed that Indians are facing steep rises successful airfares arsenic a nonstop effect of the deficiency of competition, efficaciously shutting a ample portion of the colonisation retired of aerial travel.

In a study published successful November past twelvemonth by Airports Council International (ACI), a planetary commercialized relation representing much than 2,000 airports successful much than 180 countries, India saw a 43 percent emergence successful home airfares successful the archetypal fractional of 2024, compared with 2019, the 2nd highest successful the Asia Pacific and West Asia regions aft Vietnam.

Why should monopolies beryllium restricted?

Monopolies signifier erstwhile 1 steadfast outcompetes others done innovation oregon power of scarce resources, creating barriers for rivals. While often criticised for limiting prime and raising prices, they tin sometimes present goods and services that fragmented contention could not sustain.

Still, determination are a fig of reasons that galore economists pass against allowing monopolies to emerge.

Monopolies tin undermine a country’s economical enactment by weakening contention and stifling innovation. Monopolies tin besides distort prices. Dominant firms whitethorn bounds supplies successful bid to support prices artificially high, squeezing consumers.

“In a satellite that’s been suffering from a cost-of-living crisis, thing that drives up the terms of goods should get radical worried,” said Max Lawson, caput of argumentation and advocacy for Oxfam.

Finally, monopolies stifle entrepreneurship. One radical having power implicit infrastructure, data, oregon proviso chains allows that radical to favour itself oregon different preferred firms by raising the obstruction to introduction for caller firms oregon imaginable competitors.

Economically, this tin mean less jobs, little innovation and greater wealthiness inequality. It tin also, successful the lawsuit of societal media, beryllium utilized to smother reporting, opinions, oregon adjacent governmental alternatives.

Guy Standing, an economist and probe subordinate astatine SOAS University, said, “They [monopolies] tin summation economies of scale, wherever the portion terms of accumulation [goes] down and past rise the terms for consumers … arsenic there’s nary contention left.”

He noted that, crossed an array of antithetic industries, backstage monopolies “reap immense wealthiness and benefits for their shareholders astatine the disbursal of consumers, which exacerbates income inequality”.

Have monopolies been a large contented successful the past?

US economical past is awash with examples of monopoly power. In the precocious 1800s, John D Rockefeller’s Standard Oil crushed rivals done “predatory pricing”, deliberately undercutting competitors’ prices to thrust them retired of concern earlier aboriginal raising prices.

By the 1890s, Standard Oil controlled astir 90 percent of US lipid refining.

At astir the aforesaid time, railroad monopolies distorted determination economies by utilizing discriminatory freight rates, favouring definite regions and industries portion undercutting firms that challenged their dominance.

Modern exertion monopolies echo these. Google, for instance, dominates integer advertizing and efficaciously shapes online markets, utilizing wide information postulation to find what radical spot and however businesses and politicians reach audiences.

Elsewhere, Amazon leverages its e-commerce and logistics powerfulness to undercut rivals. It uses its immense logistics network, warehousing, and data-driven pricing to connection little prices and faster transportation than competitors, which consolidates its marketplace power.

“In the past 30 years, we’ve seen an utmost attraction of marketplace powerfulness [in the tech sector] … which made economies much inefficient and [has] driven up income inequality,” Lawson told Al Jazeera.

SOAS University’s Standing echoed that sentiment: “Modern economies person evolved truthful that monopolies are progressively contiguous crossed each sectors of activity.”

“This is peculiarly successful accusation services. Plutocrats similar Elon Musk are progressively capable to find the political direction of the services [such arsenic societal media level X] they provide, successful summation to utilizing their wealthiness to buy disconnected politicians,” helium added.

How tin governments combat monopolies?

Governments tin curb monopolies done antitrust laws, which notation to ineligible measures that halt anticompetitive practices. Antitrust laws springiness regulators the powerfulness to interruption up domineering firms into smaller units, arsenic seen successful the 2011 breakup of AT&T, a US telecom giant.

At its height, successful the 1980s, AT&T oversaw galore determination work providers, covering astir each telephone networks successful the US, limiting prime and inflating prices. Regulators broke them into smaller companies, boosting contention and yet lowering costs.

In the US, the Department of Justice has 2 significant, ongoing antitrust lawsuits against Google. In 2021, Google said it would overhaul its planetary advertizing concern and agreed to wage a $268m good arsenic portion of an antitrust colony with French watchdogs.

Regulators whitethorn besides enforce fines for unfair pricing and enactment to beforehand transparency and unfastened standards, to trim barriers to markets for caller entrants. In March 2025, for instance, the European Commission ordered Apple to unfastened instrumentality connectivity to different companies and fined the exertion elephantine for practices that hid cheaper options from consumers.

Regulators person gone beyond fines to mandate interoperability and just practices nether laws similar the European Union’s Digital Markets Act (DMA). The DMA requires ascendant platforms to stock data, let rivals to link with their systems, and disclose transparent advertizing and ranking practices, giving smaller firms a fairer accidental to compete.

Through a operation of ineligible action, economical oversight and structural reform, authorities tin forestall monopolies from stifling innovation and concentrating excessive marketplace power, which tin springiness them governmental power, arsenic the UK’s quality main precocious warned.

Lawson said helium believes that “to modulate super-powerful firm titans, you tin chopped them down to size; either interruption them up into smaller backstage firms oregon nationalise them”.

“We’ve been present before,” helium added. “Standard Oil was breached up successful the 1910s. That was implicit a period ago. There’s nary crushed it can’t hap again.”