Epic Games CEO, Stephen Bannon bash “gangsters” from Apple and Google

Tim Sweeney, the CEO of Fortnite maker Epic Games, seems really mad at Apple and Google. On stage during a tech event, he called both tech giants “gangster-style businesses.”

Epic Games has played a big role in the battle against big tech monopolies over the past few years. The firm sued both Apple and Google for monopolism on their app stores.

The company won the antitrust case against Google but not against Apple, even though the court did require the latter to open up to more competition.

Epic Games CEO Sweeney seems eager to continue fighting. At a Y Combinator Little Tech Competition Summit, he called both companies “gangster-style businesses” and said they were still engaged in illegal practices.

“The sad truth is that Apple and Google are no longer good-faith, law-abiding companies,” said Sweeney.

“They’re run, in many ways, as gangster-style businesses that will do anything they think they can get away with. If they think that the fine is going to be cheaper than the lost revenue from an illegal practice, they always continue the illegal practice and pay the fine.”

Y Combinator Little Tech Competition Summit - April 2 https://t.co/hJvs1OqVHi

undefined Y Combinator (@ycombinator) April 2, 2025

According to Sweeney, Apple and Google hurt his business. For example, when Android users try to install the Epic Games Store on their devices, Google immediately tells them that the software is from an “unknown source.”

Sweeney called it a “scare screen,” which makes around 50-60% of users have doubts and stop the installation. Similar drop-off rates are reportedly found on iOS.

“Crime pays for big tech companies. Obviously, we shouldn’t expect that to change until enforcement becomes much, much more vigorous,” said the CEO of the Fortnite creator.

On that same stage, Stephen Bannon, the far-right provocateur and a close ally of US President Donald Trump, also attacked big tech companies – even though most of them have been trying to play it nice with the new administration.

“Tech oligarchs fear populism,” said Bannon, also, surprisingly, praising Lina Khan, the former chair of the Federal Trade Commission, for “fighting monopolies and oligarchs for years.”

“One of the biggest scourges of our country are these oligarchs: the lords of easy money in Wall Street, the corporatists, and, particularly, the apartheid state of Silicon Valley,” he added.

Khan said this week that when antitrust enforcement isn’t sufficiently aggressive, it hurts the functioning of the free market, and that’s one reason why there is more agreement across ideological lines on that topic than on others.