A $ 5 Billion Fine for Google Announces Major Changes and Judicial Battles

by
Tony Romm

The $ 5 billion record fine imposed on Google for bundling its apps on Android and undermining its competitors could result in major changes in the world's most popular mobile operating system and risk legal battles for decades to come. 19659003] Margrethe Vestager, chief competition officer of the European Union, ordered the company this week to stop pushing its own search tools and web browsing on smartphones and tablets running the Google Android system. Two years after the charges were laid, it blamed Google for using Android as a means to consolidate its strong position in search, while making it more difficult for competitors to offer competing applications and services.

Vestager gave Google 90 days to an end "or face additional fines from the EU." It is up to Google to restructure its relationship with device manufacturers, to whom it authorizes Android for free, and submit patches to European regulators for approval – a wide range of potential changes that leaves in the air how much of Google more than 2 billion Android users will be concerned. [19659003] For years, Google has asked phone makers like Samsung, LG and Huawei to set Google as the default search engine on Android devices and install the Chrome web browser. "The EU said 95% of Android users excluding China use Google Search, telling regulators that the vast majority of people do not change their settings.

The consolidation of these applications allows Google to collect data on mobile users and ensures a wide audience using Google products, which allows the company to broadcast more advertising. It also supports some of the "costs badociated with building Android," said Google CEO, Sundar Pichai, in his defense of Google's practices.

Advertisement

"Today's decision rejects the business model that supports Android, which has created more choice for everyone, not less", writes he on the company's blog on Wednesday. Google said it would appeal the decision and declined to comment further.

European pressure on Google points out how the biggest threat to the power and reach of US tech giants comes from across the Atlantic. The fine is the second European antitrust sanction on Google in a year, and Vestager said Wednesday that European regulators are still exploring other areas of the company, including research and advertising. Such constant regulatory control has helped Microsoft break out of its breakthrough on the technology industry more than a decade ago and has been distracting from generational changes in the way people use technology, such as the rise of mobile phones. of the antitrust policy, where the United States or [the EU] went after the cutting-edge firms of innovation, it puts a damper on their aggression, "said Rob Atkinson, president of the United States. Information Technology Industry Foundation, Google is a member of the board of directors. He criticized the EU decision

at a press conference Wednesday, Vestager suggested that she was not ready to break Google into small businesses. But the total of $ 8 billion in European fines accumulated by Google since last year, as well as the months it spends reorganizing its business to satisfy European regulators, could reduce the dynamics of the third most valuable American society.

For consumers, the result could be a different Android experience today. While the EU decision concerns only Android users in the region, the changes that Google makes to its agreements with device makers could apply to smartphones around the world if the giant technology considers the various markets too burdensome. Similarly, companies in Silicon Valley, including Google and Facebook, have introduced new privacy rules in May for users around the world after the entry into force of new stringent European protections.

a new Android phone store. In the face of antitrust charges previously, Google has given people the opportunity to choose between services when setting up their phones. An antitrust dispute in Russia, for example, has prompted Google to change its design to offer people a choice of search engines on the Chrome browser when they install their phones.

"Part of what you are trying to do with a C remedy is how you can create new technologies and new innovations," said Jonathan Kanter, former federal regulator of the Paul Weiss's partner He has already worked with Microsoft in earlier battles against Google.

On one side, Google might look more like Apple, which totally controls its operating system and its devices – iPhones and iPads – said Larry Downes, project director at the Georgetown Center for Business and Public Policy and a columnist for the Washington Post.If Google adopted this model, it may have to sell the Android operating system to smartphone makers at the start. "Europe last asked for major changes to Google's business practices a year ago, after Vestager discovered that the business rise had given first-rate real estate results in its research results to its own purchases. comparison tool – while disadvantaging the offers of its competitors. The complaint, led by local rivals like Foundem, came with a $ 2.7 billion fine, and Google had to change its policy to allow other comparison sites to bid for niche markets. top of the research results. Google's opponents have said that the change is insufficient, and the EU has not yet ruled on the subject.

While Vestager brandished European laws on competition and consumer protection against Google, US regulators were more reluctant to challenge the company. The EU and the US are looking at competition differently: the US is focusing on the harm done to consumers, while Europe is more receptive to the harms suffered by competitors

2013 without penalties major – a fact that annoys some in Congress who see more and more Google as too big and powerful.

"The FTC should end its decade of inaction and deference and face growing evidence that Google's business practices have stifled." Strong competition in a marketplace that is critical to our economy and society ", said Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal. "The European decision could serve as a new" forcing mechanism "urging regulators around the world to scrutinize the technology giant, said Luther Lowe, vice president of public policy and government, at Yelp, a constant adversary. The online criticism site has filed several antitrust complaints challenging Google's business practices.

More than a decade ago, Google was in a similar position to Yelp, backing down on how the dominant player at the time, Microsoft, own software, including Internet Explorer, with Windows. "We think users should choose," said Marissa Mayer, then senior Google manager in 2006.

Microsoft had to deal with American regulators who were looking to break the company, and a series of fines in Europe after complying with the requirements of the region. Microsoft's antitrust fight was that it distracted the software giant based in Redmond, Washington, while allowing new competitors, including Google, to flourish.

"Microsoft has been overthrown often enough to wake up and smell coffee," said Alec Burnside, a European antitrust attorney at Dechert, who has represented some of Google's critics. "The parallels are pretty easy to find. "

Google's allies insist that the tech giant will not suffer the same fate because the company is aware of the risk of losing focus." There are so many areas of innovation active in the company I believe they have strived to protect it, "said Ed Black, president of Computers & Communications Industry Association, a business group that includes Google. [19659003The1945Post