[Dev News] AppLovin Sues Unity

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AppLovin have just announced a lawsuit against Unity as well as filing for a temporary restraining order. They are accusing Unity of harvesting data using their new Ad Quality SDK and using that data to train their own ad serving data models.

Details of the lawsuit:

AppLovin has asked the Superior Court of California in San Francisco to temporarily restrict rival Unity from collecting and using certain data generated through its mobile advertising business, escalating a dispute between two of the sector’s largest platforms that is also heading to arbitration.

In an application for a temporary restraining order, AppLovin alleges Unity’s Ad Quality SDK has improperly collected data relating to advertisements served by AppLovin, including information about creatives, users and devices, impression revenue and engagement.

AppLovin further alleges, “on information and belief,” that Unity has fed its data into models used to compete against AppLovin in mobile advertising auctions. The company claims Unity has used AppLovin’s “own output to train those models and to model AppLovin’s ad decisions.” Those claims are AppLovin’s allegations and have not been adjudicated.

Unity’s response is… well… snarky? It’s refreshingly human, especially in a legal context:

“AppLovin’s legal filings against us are a classic case of a dominant incumbent resorting to litigation and intimidation to address increased competition and slowing growth,” said a Unity spokesperson in a provided statement.

“AppLovin has demanded that we shut down features of a small, free product we operate called Ad Quality. As its name suggests, Ad Quality helps prevent inappropriate and harmful ads from appearing in games. AppLovin clearly believes the data our customers choose to share with us through Ad Quality is driving our sharply improving performance. Despite that performance greatly benefiting our mutual customers, or rather because of it, they will do anything to slow it down,” said the Unity spoksperson.

“In reality, Ad Quality isn’t the driver of our improved performance, so they’ll be frustrated in that attempt regardless of how this suit is adjudicated,” the Unity statement continued.

Key Links

DigiDay Coverage

Unity Ad Quality SDK

You can learn more about the battle between AppLovin and Unity in the below.