Four of the largest US BigTech companies have topped the list for EU lobby spending, according to new research.

A study from campaign groups Corporate Europe Observatory and LobbyControl found that Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Apple have spent the most on lobbying EU institutions.

The report revealed that 612 companies, groups, and business associations spent over €97 million annually lobbying the EU institutions.

Google topped the list, spending €5.8 million, while Facebook was a close second, spending €5.5 million.

Microsoft has spent €5.3 million on EU lobbying and Apple forked out €3.5 million.

Huawei has also spent a large sum of €3 million, while Amazon spent €2.8 million.

IBM, Intel, QUALCOMM, and Vodafone all spent nearly €2 million lobbying the EU.

EU lobbying is dominated by just ten companies, which are responsible for almost a third of the total tech lobby spend.

Vodafone, Qualcomm, Intel, IBM, Amazon, Huawei, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook and Google spend more than €32 million annually.

“The economic and political power of the digital giants is hefty, and they are not going to remain passive in the face of possible new rules that affect the way they conduct their business,” said Tommaso Valletti, former chief economist of the competition directorate of the EU Commission and professor of economics at the Imperial College. “That‘s why the EU Institutions urgently need to change the way they handle this lobbying and limit the power of BigTech.”

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