Ahead of a battle with the US Department of Justice over antitrust violations, Google’s has taken an arrow to the knee by the EU General Court which upheld a 2018 decision to fine the company €4.125 billion in regards to its handling of Android in the market.
According to press release No. 147/22 from the Court of Justice of the European Union, Google “unlawful restrictions on manufacturers of Android mobile devices and mobile network operators in order to consolidate the dominant position of its search engine.”
Google has been arguing its case against this particular suit for close to four years and today’s decision reflects the General Courts infringement reasoning while two other cases work their way through the system. Despite the General Court reducing the fine amount from its original €4.343 billion price tag, Google could pay close to $8 billion if the other two major suits against them follow similar reasoning as the General Court’s.
Meanwhile, Google is also fending off Texas, Nebraska and Colorado-led antitrust suits as well as preparing to go to court against the DOJ sometime next year.
Fortunately, for Google, US laws are bit more lenient when it comes to consumer harm vs. corporate allowances and the U.S. District Court has already chipped away at the Texas-led antitrust suite and gave the company a chance to issue the following statement,
Today’s decision underscores how [the Texas] case is deeply flawed, as we’ve long said, advertising technology is a fiercely competitive industry — and our products increase choice for publishers, advertisers, and consumers while enabling small businesses to affordably find new customers. We look forward to setting the record straight about the remaining claims.
Google has quite a few legal plates spinning and it’ll be interesting to see which ones fall and which ones the company can keep in the air.
