Apple halves App Store fee for the smaller companies

Apple, facing growing antitrust scrutiny over what it charges other companies for access to its App Store, said Wednesday that it would cut in half the fee it took from the smallest app developers.

Developers that brought in $1 million or less from their apps in the previous year will pay a 15% commission on those app sales starting next year, down from 30%, the company said.

The move, which will have little impact on Apple’s bottom line, is an abrupt change from the company’s public intransigence over its fees. For 12 years, the App Store has helped fuel Apple’s remarkable growth, and the company has appeared reluctant to do anything to tamper with it. Even when its fee policy emerged as the focus of antitrust complaints, Apple aggressively defended it.