The U.K. Competition and Markets Authority said it was opening dual probes into both U.S. tech giants to assess whether they hold “strategic market status” in their respective mobile ecosystems, including operating systems, app stores and smartphone-based browsers. The investigations will “explore the impact on people who use mobile devices and the thousands of businesses developing innovative services or content such as apps for these devices,” the CMA said. “Apple believes in thriving and dynamic markets where innovation can flourish,” an Apple spokesperson told CNBC. “We face competition in every segment and jurisdiction where we operate, and our focus is always the trust of our users.” “In the U.K. alone, the iOS app economy supports hundreds of thousands of jobs and makes it possible for developers big and small to reach users on a trusted platform,” the Apple spokesperson added. “We will continue to engage constructively with the CMA as their work on this matter progresses.”

The UK government has announced the launch of two antitrust investigations into the mobile ecosystems of both Apple and Google by the country’s competition watchdog, the Competition and Markets Authority.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is investigating whether the two companies should loosen their control of the sector, potentially by allowing competitors to use their technology. Google owns Android, the operating system software that comes pre-installed on most of the UK’s smartphones, as well as the Google Play app store and the Chrome web browser. Apple, meanwhile, uses its own iOS operating system to power its iPhones, which also contain its App Store and Safari web browser software. Together, the two companies control almost every avenue through which British smartphone users access the internet through their phones as well as how the developers of phone apps market them to consumers. As a result, the CMA said it would investigate whether the two tech giants should be given ‘strategic market status’ (SMS), which would make them subject to tougher rules on how they conduct business in the UK. A company obtains SMS if its UK sales are more than £1 billion, or if it generates worldwide sales of over £25 billion, and it is considered to have a ‘substantial and entrenched’ position in the market in which it operates. Under the rules, the CMA could force Apple and Google to allow third parties greater access to the software that powers their operating systems and app stores in order to provide a wider choice of products to consumers.