Global digital markets are increasingly becoming dominated by a small number of large companies, which is critical for consumers and developing economies. The UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD) Global Trade Update, released 8 July 2025, emphasizes today that seven global companies out of ten have now become digital giants across sectors (cloud, e-commerce, AI, and digital advertising).

In 2017 their combined share was 21%, and by 2025 it had increased to 48%. The top five multinational digital companies increased their share of assets from 17% to 35%. The advent of generative AI adds a further dimension to this, with technology leaders Microsoft and Google controlling key inputs such as Microsoft's Cloud, computing resources and chips, cloud services, and data, further growing their acceptability and influence by steering several start-ups, such as OpenAI, through partnerships and collaboration.

When there is less competition, consumers can incur many costs, from higher prices to less innovation, or lower data privacy and less choice. The larger the consolidation of Big Tech, the greater the risk exists of expanding digital inequalities across the world, in particular for developing countries. Governments across the world are grappling with these issues, and since the E.U. passed the Digital Markets Act in 2022, at least 19 other countries, including India, Australia, Japan, and South Africa, have passed or proposed similar measures.

At the international level, the ways in which states regulate tech organically increased in number from 14 in 2020 to 153 in 2024. However, interventions have taken place unevenly: Europe and Asia have outpaced Africa and parts of Latin America in terms of faster progress, UNCTAD states that building fairer digital ecosystems will require coordinated enforcement of competition law across horizons along with investment in infrastructure, support for skills development, and funding available for start-ups. These will require major steps to ensure that benefits of digitalization are less divided among a small global few.