European Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton delivers a speech during a press conference at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
Josep Lago | Afp | Getty Images
BARCELONA, Spain — A top European Union official insisted Monday that the debate around tech giants paying for their usage of telecom networks is not sparking a “battle” between Big Tech and telcos.
Telecom groups are pushing European regulators to implement a framework where the companies that send traffic along their networks are charged a fee. They say this — known as “sender pays” — would help fund mammoth upgrades to their infrastructure.
Their logic is that certain platforms, like Amazon Prime and Netflix, chew through gargantuan amounts of data and should therefore foot part of the bill for adding new capacity to cope with the increased strain.
Last week, the EU launched a consultation aimed at boosting Europe’s telecoms infrastructure. In it, there was a questionnaire asking whether to establish a digital fund at the EU or national level, or require a direct contribution from internet giants to the telco operators.
At the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, European Commissioner for the Internal Market Thierry Breton suggested that regulation in the EU was no longer fit for purpose and that it was time to reconsider how the current model works.
“We are at the beginning of a new revolution. In the coming years, the whole industry will need to undergo a radical shift and revisit its business models,” Breton said on stage at MWC.
“The consultation has been described by many as the battle over fair share between Big Telco and Big Tech. A binary choice between those who provide networks today and those who feed them with the traffic.”
However, he insisted that there is not necessarily a “battle over fair share between Big Telco and Big Tech.”
Ha said the bloc needed to “find a financing model for the huge investments needed” in the development of next-generation mobile networks and emerging technologies like the metaverse — while also making sure that net neutrality rules aren’t undermined.
It comes as telcos attempt to reinvent themselves as cloud-based businesses. On Monday, several firms, including Deutsche Telekom, Orange, and Telefonica announced new application programming interfaces, or APIs, which would open up their networks to software developers.
There are also attempts to make peace between the two parties. Prior to Breton’s keynote, the bosses of Microsoft and Google’s cloud unit appeared virtually, talking up their commitments to the telecom industry.
The CEO of Orange, Christel Heydemann, pushed back on claims that requiring companies to pay for network usage would amount to an internet “tax.” She added that it was a “first step” toward addressing an “unbalanced situation.”
WATCH:European telcos want U.S. big tech to pay for the internet — but tech giants are hitting back
Shares of Intuit popped about 9% on Friday, a day after the company reported quarterly results that beat analysts’ estimates and issued rosy guidance for the full year.
Intuit, which is best known for its TurboTax and QuickBooks software, said revenue in the fiscal third quarter increased 15% to $7.8 billion. Net income rose 18% to $2.82 billion, or $10.02 per share, from $2.39 billion, or $8.42 per share, a year earlier.
“This is the fastest organic growth that we have had in over a decade,” Intuit CEO Sasan Goodarzi told CNBC’s “Closing Bell: Overtime” on Thursday. “It’s really incredible growth across the platform.”
For its full fiscal year, Intuit said it expects to report revenue of $18.72 billion to $18.76 billion, up from the range of $18.16 billion to $18.35 billion it shared last quarter. Analysts were expecting $18.35 billion, according to LSEG.
“We’re redefining what’s possible with [artificial intelligence] by becoming a one-stop shop of AI-agents and AI-enabled human experts to fuel the success of consumers and small and mid-market businesses,” Goodarzi said in a release Thursday.
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Goldman Sachs analysts reiterated their buy rating on the stock and raised their price target to $860 from $750 on Thursday. The analysts said Intuit’s execution across its core growth pillars is “reinforcing confidence” in its growth profile over the long term.
The company’s AI roadmap, which includes the introduction of AI agents, will add additional upside, the analysts added.
“In our view, Intuit stands out as a rare asset straddling both consumer and business ecosystems, all while supplemented by AI-prioritization,” the Goldman Sachs analysts wrote in a note.
Analysts at Deutsche Bank also reiterated their buy rating on the stock and raised their price target to $815 from $750.
They said the company’s results were “reassuring” after a rocky two years and that they feel more confident about its ability to grow the consumer business.
“Longer term, we continue to believe Intuit presents a unique investment opportunity and we see its platform approach powering accelerated innovation with leverage, thus enabling sustained mid-teens or better EPS growth,” the analysts wrote in a Friday note.
FILE PHOTO: Apple CEO Tim Cook escorts U.S. President Donald Trump as he tours Apple’s Mac Pro manufacturing plant with in Austin, Texas, U.S., November 20, 2019.
Last week, Trump said he “had a little problem with Tim Cook,” and on Friday, he threatened to slap a 25% tariff on iPhones in a social media post.
Trump is upset with Apple’s plan to source the majority of iPhones sold in the U.S. from its factory partners in India, instead of China. Cook officially confirmed this plan earlier this month during earnings.
Trump wants Apple to build iPhones for the U.S. market in the U.S. and has continued to pressure the company and Cook.
“I have long ago informed Tim Cook of Apple that I expect their iPhone’s that will be sold in the United States of America will be manufactured and built in the United States, not India, or anyplace else,” Trump posted on Truth Social on Friday.
Analysts said it would probably make more sense for Apple to eat the cost rather than move production stateside.
“In terms of profitability, it’s way better for Apple to take the hit of a 25% tariff on iPhones sold in the US market than to move iPhone assembly lines back to US,” wrote Apple supply chain analyst Ming-Chi Kuo on X.
UBS analyst David Vogt said that the potential 25% tariffs were a “jarring headline,” but that they would only be a “modest headwind” to Apple’s earnings, dropping annual earnings by 51 cents per share, versus a prior expectation of 34 cents per share under the current tariff landscape.
Experts have long held that a U.S.-made iPhone is impossible at worst and highly expensive at best.
Analysts have said that made in U.S.A. iPhones would be much more expensive, CNBC previously reported, with some estimates ranging between $1,500 to $3,500 to buy one at retail. Labor costs would certainly rise.
But it would also be logistically complicated.
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Supply chains and factories take years to build out, including installing equipment and staffing up. Parts that Apple imported to the United States for assembly might be subject to tariffs as well.
Apple started manufacturing iPhones in India in 2017 but it was only in recent years that the region was capable of building Apple’s latest devices.
“We believe the concept of Apple producing iPhones in the US is a fairy tale that is not feasible,” wrote Wedbush analyst Dan Ives in a note on Friday.
Other analysts were wary about predicting how Trump’s threat ultimately plays out. Apple might be able to strike a deal with the administration — despite the eroding relationship — or challenge the tariffs in court.
For now, most of Apple’s most important products are exempt from tariffs after Trump gave phones and computers a tariff waiver — even from China — in April, but Apple doesn’t know how the Trump administration’s tariffs will ultimately play out beyond June.
“We’re skeptical,” that the 25% tariff will materialize, wrote Wells Fargo analyst Aaron Rakers.
He wrote that Apple could try to preserve its roughly 41% gross margin on iPhones by raising prices in the U.S. by between $100 or $300 per phone.
It’s unclear how Trump intends to target Apple’s India-made iPhones. Rakers wrote that the administration could put specific tariffs on phone imports from India.
Apple’s operations in India continue to expand.
Foxconn, which assembles iPhones for Apple, is building a new $1.5 billion factory in India that could do some iPhone production, the Financial Times reported Thursday.
Palantir co-founder and CEO Alex Karp speaks during the Hill & Valley Forum at the U.S. Capitol Visitor Center Auditorium in Washington, D.C., on April 30, 2025.
The stock transactions occurred on Tuesday and Wednesday between $125.26 and $127.70 per share. Following the stock sales, Karp owned about 6.43 million shares of Palantir stock, worth about $787 million based on Thursday’s closing price.
The sales were connected to a series of automatic share sales to cover required tax withholding obligations tied to vesting restricted stock units, according to filings.
Other top executives at the Denver-based company also unloaded stock.
Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar sold about $21 million worth of Palantir stock, while co-founder and president Stephen Cohen dumped about $43.5 million in shares.
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Palantir shares have notched fresh highs in recent weeks as the company leapt above Salesforce in market value and into the top 10 most valuable U.S. tech firms.
The digital analytics company has benefited from bets on AI and a surge in government contracts as companies prioritize streamlining and President Donald Trump targets a federal overhaul with the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency.
The stock has outperformed its tech peers since the start of 2025, surging nearly 62%, but investors are paying a high multiple on shares.
In its earnings report earlier this month, the company lifted its full-year guidance due to AI adoption, but shares fell on international growth concerns.
“You don’t have to buy our shares,” Karp told CNBC as shares slumped. “We’re happy. We’re going to partner with the world’s best people and we’re going to dominate. You can be along for the ride or you don’t have to be.”