The story behind Google's secret offer to adjust the Android probe of the EU

Brussels: EU Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager coldly hit Google with 4 , 3 billion euros Fine of $ 5 billion last week, the heaviest penalty in the history of antitrust enforcement.

This has not been The case

A year earlier, the company was already fined 2.4 billion euros in another unobtrusive attempt by the EU to settle the investigation in the business that she has entered into with Android phone makers, the answer was just as cautious.

The Silicon Valley research giant had been waiting too long for an agreement., said Vestager, 50 years, during an interview.When a company wants to install, it must "tend immediately after "having received the initial complaint or EU Statement of Objections

" This did not happen in this case. case, then of course he takes the road that he has now taken, "said Vestager settlement negotiations, which have not been reported previously." So, no surprises. "

Google, a Alphabet Inc. unit, has been one of the biggest antitrust targets in the EU, with three polls, countless headlines and a steady beating of small rivals and discerning customers. The company has now failed twice to find solutions to settle its business in its shopping and Android services, resulting in fines totaling 6.7 billion euros – with an imminent threat yet to come.

Google declined to comment on the settlement attempts Google will appeal the EU's decision, said CEO Sundar Pichai in a blog post.The company has "shown that we are ready to make changes, "he said.

In the weeks that Following the fine of June 2017, Google's lawyers began making representations to their European counterparts. the probe in Android, one of the company's flagship products. Previous attempts to start a conversation with the EU on ways to end the investigation had failed to catch on fire as the authorities refused to negotiate, stating that people were familiar with the negotiations

. set the Android probe was easy to see.

Google gives free Android software to mobile phone manufacturers, but requires them to pre-install Google apps if they want the Play app store, which offers more than a million programs. The search giant also pays phone manufacturers, telecom operators and other browser makers to run Google's search engine that collects user data. Through these agreements, Google has recorded nearly $ 50 billion in annual sales in the mobile market, a third of the global market, according to the EMarketer research firm.

Google executives thought that Vestager had left the door open to rule out a settlement at the June 27, 2017 press conference where she announced fines in the shopping case.

"Every case is separate," she told reporters. "Obviously, I have not drawn any conclusions in the still open cases."

Encouraged, Google's lawyers wrote a letter in August suggesting possible changes to address EU concerns, according to people close to the discussions. Google said it was ready to adjust contracts to ease restrictions that the EU did not like, even by weighing the distribution of applications in two different ways in the future. The letter did not go into details, only establishing a plan to launch the talks, according to the people, who refused to be identified because the initial discussions with the regulators were confidential.

Lawyers have never received a formal answer from officials that a regulation was no longer an option. This prevented them from even discussing whether the company would be willing to pay a fine under an agreement, people said.