Google avoids breakup in monopoly case

Google has avoided being broken up in monopoly case, but a US judge has ruled that it must help rivals improve their search engine results by sharing some data from trillions of user requests.

District judge Amit Mehta also banned Google from entering into exclusive agreements with device makers that prevent them pre-installing rival services.

However, the judge stopped short of making the tech giant offload its Chrome browser or Android operating system.

Shares in Google’s parent company, Alphabet, surged more than 8pc in after-hours trading as investors cheered the judge’s ruling.

While sharing data with competitors will strengthen Google’s rivals to its market-dominating advertising business, not having to sell off Chrome or Android removes a major concern for investors who view them as key pieces to Google’s overall business.

The ruling was also a relief for Apple and other device and web browser makers, who district judge Amit Mehta said can continue to receive advertising revenue-sharing payments from Google for searches on their devices.

Google pays Apple $20bn (£14.9bn) a year, Morgan Stanley analysts said last year.

Google has said previously that it plans to file an appeal, which means it could take years before the company is required to act on the ruling.

Its chief executive, Sundar Pichai, expressed concerns at trial in the case in April that the data-sharing measures sought by the US Department of Justice could enable Google’s rivals to reverse-engineer its technology.

The ruling results from a five-year legal battle between one of the world’s most profitable companies and its home country, the US, where Judge Mehta ruled last year that the company holds an illegal monopoly in online search and related advertising.

At a trial in April, prosecutors argued for far-reaching remedies to restore competition and prevent Google from extending its dominance in search to artificial intelligence.

In addition to the case over search, Google is embroiled in litigation over its dominance in other markets.

The company recently said it will continue to fight a ruling requiring it to revamp its app store in a lawsuit won by “Fortnite” maker Epic Games.

Google is also scheduled to go to trial in September to determine remedies in a separate case brought by the US Justice Department where a judge found the company holds illegal monopolies in online advertising technology.

The Justice Department’s two cases against Google are part of a larger bipartisan crackdown by the US on Big Tech firms, which began during Donald Trump’s first term as US president and includes cases against Meta Platforms, Amazon and Apple.

View Comments