In a significant win for Google, a US district court rejected the US government’s much-discussed and arduous plan to dismantle the internet behemoth as part of remedies in a historic search antitrust lawsuit.
On Tuesday, September 2, Judge Amit Mehta of the US District Court of Columbia dismissed the Justice Department’s plan to compel Google to release its well-liked Chrome web browser, along with other “fixes” intended to restore competition in the online search engine market that Google has unlawfully monopolized.
Last year, the same court had ruled that Google had an illegal monopoly of the online search engine market. Judge Mehta then heard arguments from Google and the DOJ regarding the best ways to deal with the tech giant’s anti-competitive behavior and level the playing field for other search competitors as the case moved into the remedies phase.
In May of this year, the remedies trial ran for around 15 days. Several important witnesses spoke, including Sundar Pichai, the CEO of Google, Eddy Cue, a senior Apple official, and representatives from Perplexity and OpenAI.
Since losing the antitrust case last year, Google’s AI aspirations, especially in online search, have been clouded by the 230-page ruling. In a broader sense, it may demonstrate how the regulatory environment is changing under the pro-business Trump administration, which has been more accommodating to internet firms than its predecessor.
In the Department of Justice’s continuous battle to defend American consumers, this ruling represents a significant advancement. In a statement, US Attorney General Pamela Bondi stated, “Under President Trump’s leadership, we will continue our legal efforts to hold companies accountable for monopolistic practices.”
“We have concerns about how these requirements will impact our users and their privacy, and we’re reviewing the decision closely,” said Lee-Anne Mulholland, Google’s vice president of Regulatory Affairs, who added the ruling demonstrates how dramatically the industry has evolved with the introduction of AI.
Beyond addressing Google’s search monopoly, the US court’s decision explores important issues including search engine operations, browser economics, and whether artificial intelligence is already altering how people search for information online. Here are some important conclusions drawn from the ruling.
“Removing Chrome would be too drastic for Android.”
In one of its more drastic proposals, the DOJ had urged the court to direct Google to sell off its market-leading web browser Chrome as well as Chromium, the open-source platform underlying Chrome and other web browsers. A number of tech companies, including Yahoo and OpenAI, had indicated interest in acquiring Chrome from Google. Last month, Perplexity, an AI search startup, made an unsolicited proposal of $34.5 billion for the browser.
Legal precedent indicates that such measures were only authorized in circumstances where less severe remedies would likely prove inadequate, therefore the court determined that the proposed Chrome divestiture remedy was a “poor fit for this case.”
It stated that the plaintiffs had not demonstrated that their behavioral remedies would fail in the absence of Chrome’s prompt divestiture. The court also held that forcing Google to sell Chrome would be unreasonable as it has built it from the ground up and invested billions of dollars in the browser. Additionally, the Chrome divestiture would impact users outside the geographical scope of the case as 80 per cent of Chrome’s monthly active users are located outside the US.
It would be incredibly messy and highly risky because Chrome does not run as a standalone business and depends on Google for a host of administrative functions such as financing, marketing, back-end systems, engineering personnel, etc, as per the ruling. The court stated that it is “very doubtful that a Chrome divestiture would not result in significant product degradation and a loss of consumer welfare,” even if Chrome were acquired by a new owner.
It also stated, “That concern extends to other Chrome-based products and the Chromium open-source project.” In a similar statement, CEO Sundar Pichai, who formerly oversaw the browser’s development team, claimed that no other business was capable of maintaining Chrome and Chromium to the same extent as Google.
Additionally, if Google did not comply with additional remedies or if those remedies did not work as expected, the DOJ had suggested that Android be divested. For similar reasons, the court also denied this proposal.
Additionally, the DOJ had suggested that Android be divested if Google did not follow other remedies or if those remedies did not work as expected. For the same reasons, the court dismissed this proposal as well.
“Distributors will suffer if search deals are prohibited.”
“Search deal bans will harm distributors.”
“Search deals will be hurt by a ban.”
“Distributors will suffer if search deals are banned.”
“The emergence of AI altered the case’s trajectory.”
During the remedies trial, a lot of time was spent discussing AI. In 2020, a search antitrust case was brought against Google. ChatGPT, developed by OpenAI, emerged two years later. Apple senior vice president Eddy Cue stated in court that the number of searches for the company’s Safari browser had decreased for the first time in twenty-two years. Notably, he linked the drop in search volume to the rise of AI chatbots like ChatGPT.
During the hearings, Google contended that the shift in user behaviour was already making the search market more competitive. Unsurprisingly, the DOJ disagreed, pointing out that the business might use the same anticompetitive strategy to the default placement of its AI products. According to reports, Samsung is receiving a “enormous sum” from Google to preinstall its Gemini AI chatbot on devices.
The court concluded that while AI chatbots and traditional search engines only partially overlap in functionality, the former has not completely replaced the latter. Additionally, it has made it impossible for Google to obtain “exclusivity for its GenAI products on browsers or a Browser Developer’s device.”
Additionally, Judge Mehta expressly forbade Google from partnering with Apple “to distribute any Google GenAI product either in any Safari mode or on any Apple mobile or desktop device.”
“Data sharing can aid in bridging the quality gap.”
The court adopted some of the DOJ’s suggested remedies, albeit in limited versions, but rejected the majority of them. It has ordered Google to make certain search index data available to rivals at a marginal cost. “Making data available to competitors would narrow the scale gap created by Google’s exclusive distribution agreements and, in turn, the quality gap that followed,” Judge Mehta wrote.
But according to the court, a search index is only defined as “databases that store and organize information about websites and their content that is crawled from the web.” Databases that hold data “gathered from data feeds” and “collected via partnerships,” for example, are not included.
The court has also directed Google to offer search and search text ads syndication services to enable its rivals to deliver higher-quality search results and ads. Five-year licenses will be used to offer these search syndication services.
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