“Google is set to face a record-busting EU antitrust fine this week over its Android mobile operating system but rivals hoping that an order to halt unfair business practices will help them may be disappointed,” Foo Yun Chee reports for Reuters. “The European Commission’s decision, delayed by a week by U.S. President Donald Trump’s visit to a NATO summit in Brussels last week, is expected on Wednesday.”
“It comes just over a year after the Commission slapped a landmark 2.4-billion-euro ($2.8 billion) penalty on Google, a unit of Alphabet Inc, for favouring its shopping service over those of competitors,” Chee reports. “The EU penalty is likely to exceed the 2017 fine because of the broader scope of the Android case, sources familiar with the matter have told Reuters.”
“The Android decision is the most important of a trio of antitrust cases against Google. With the company able to make its ads show up in more smartphone apps than any other tech rival, Google’s app network has quietly become a huge growth engine,” Chee reports. “Regulators say Google has tilted the field in its favour by forcing smartphone makers to pre-install Google Search together with its Play Store and Chrome browser, sign agreements not to sell devices on rival Android systems and also pay smartphone makers to only pre-install Google Search on devices.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Regardless of the amount of fine, it’ll be too little, too late. To actaully restore competition in search and online advertising, Google would need to be broken up.
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