Intuit

Intuit Inc. is a Mountain View software company. TurboTax is the largest consumer tax-preparation brand in the United States. QuickBooks is the default ledger for a large share of small businesses. Credit Karma and Mailchimp extended the company into credit and marketing.

The Federal Trade Commission sued Intuit over TurboTax 'free' advertising, alleging many filers were steered into paid products. That case is a consumer-protection action under the FTC Act, not a monopolization trial, but it sits on top of a market where the IRS Free File program and Intuit's influence over it have been criticized for years.

QuickBooks files do not move cleanly to rival ledgers. Accountants train on one product, banks accept one set of exports, and payroll add-ons are sold beside the ledger. That is classic software lock-in: the switching cost is the historical file plus the accountant's habit, not a contract that forbids leaving.

Credit Karma gives Intuit a stream of consumer financial data that can be used to market TurboTax and credit products. Bundling a free credit score with a paid tax product is a tying-adjacent business model even when each product can be skipped.

Consumer tax software is concentrated. Public options such as IRS Direct File change the outside option. Intuit's response to public filing is a competition fact, because a dominant private preparer has reasons to prefer complexity.

The FTC's 'free' TurboTax case constrains marketing claims. It does not, by itself, cap TurboTax's share or force file portability.

QuickBooks' ecosystem of apps and accountants is a distribution moat. A new ledger has to win the bookkeeper, not just the founder.

Mailchimp's email tools tie marketing data to the same login as accounting for some customers. Data combination across products is the same pattern EU DMA cases examine at larger platforms.

Households meet Intuit once a year in tax season, often after an ad that said free. The FTC case is about that moment.

A small business that wants to leave QuickBooks budgets time and accountant fees, not just a software subscription. Add-on payroll and payments make the exit larger.