Google charged €4.1Bn fine by EU court
2022-09-16The General Court of the European Union (EU) confirmed Google abused its dominant position as an Android provider and fined it €4.1 billion. The decision comes for the 2018 case when the EU Competition Commission fined the California-based company for bundling Android OS with Google services.
The General Court stated, “As regards the pre-installation conditions imposed on manufacturers of mobile devices, the commission concluded that they were abusive, distinguishing, on the one hand, the Google Search and Play Store apps bundle from the Chrome browser, Google Search and Play Store apps bundle, and finding, on the other hand, that those bundles had restricted competition during the infringement period, for which Google had been unable to demonstrate any objective justification.”
The court upheld the charge that originally claimed Google was making phone makers pre-install the Chrome browser and Search app as a part of a revenue-sharing scheme. The ruling disagreed that sharing revenue is also part of the original abuse, so the fine was lowered from its original €4.3 billion value.
Google said it was disappointed that the court did not “annul the decision in full.” The company had argued that Android has resulted in low-cost phones and driven competition with Apple. “Android has created more choice for everyone, not less, and supports thousands of successful businesses in Europe and around the world,” Google said.
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