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The EU is preparing to impose on Google a new multi-billion euro fine, this time in the Android antitrust case, according to several sources, a decision that may further deteriorate its relations with the United States
During a telephone interview on Tuesday night, EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager was supposed to inform Google's number one, Sundar Pichai, of his decision, according to a source familiar with the matter.
The European executive and the Mountain View firm refused to comment on this information.
This financial sanctions, intended to punish the US company for abusing the dominant position of its smartphone operating system, Android, to establish the supremacy of its own applications and above all its online search service, should probably spray the last record.
This record is held by Google, condemned by the European Commission, on June 27, 2017, to pay 2.42 billion euros for abusing its dominant position in online research by promoting its price comparator "Google Shopping ", to the detriment of competing services.
The amount of the fine is decided at the last moment and can theoretically reach, according to European competition rules, up to 10% of the total turnover of the company, which amounted to Alphabet, parent company of Google, to 110.9 billion dollars in 2017 (94.7 billion euros).
This new sanction against the American giant comes in a particularly tense context between the EU and the United States, with whom the subjects of friction are not lacking, as on NATO or trade.
Next Wednesday, in a week to the day, the President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, must also go to Washington to try to defuse the trade dispute between the EU and US President Donald Trump , ready to tax imports of European cars in his country.
– Financial Incentives –
The Android Antitrust File – Operating system used for 80% of devices in Europe and around the world, which is the equivalent of IOS for the Apple iPhone- – has been in the sights of the European Commission for several years.
In its April 20, 2016 complaints to Google, the European Commission first accused the US of obliging smartphone makers, such as Samsung's Korean or Chinese Huawei, to pre-install "Google Search" and set it up as default or exclusive search service on the vast majority of Android devices sold in Europe.
Secondly, the Commission accused Google of preventing manufacturers from selling smartphones running under competing operating systems, and thirdly of providing financial incentives to manufacturers and mobile network operators on the condition that they pre-install exclusive Google Search on their devices.
After more than two years of discussions, the Mountain View firm failed to convince the European executive. The record fine should be accompanied by an injunction to change behavior within 90 days.
In the case antitrust Shopping, Google had proposed remedies in September, still under review by the European Commission.
The Californian group had also filed in September 2017 an appeal against the fine of Brussels, before the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU), which should not fail to do either in the Android folder.
Given the complexity of the cases, it would take about two years before a court decision.
In addition to Shopping and Android, the European Commission has a third fire on Google: its advertising practices.
Since July 14, 2016, it has accused it of abusing its dominant position with its advertising agency AdSense (80% of the European market) by artificially limiting the possibility for third-party websites to display contextual advertising from competitors. There too a fine could appear.
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