Google Chrome on smartphone. Photo: Stockinq / Shutterstock.com The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in Luxembourg today (Thursday, July 1) put an end to the protracted legal saga of the American technology giant Google, and definitively and completely rejected the appeal filed by the company against a fine imposed on it for violating free competition.
Following the decision, parent company Alphabet will be forced to pay an unprecedented sum of 4.125 billion euros (about 4.67 billion dollars).
The judges of the highest court in the European Union accepted the position of the regulators and stated: "The appeal brought by Google and its parent company Alphabet against the judgment of the General Court is dismissed, thereby confirming the penalty imposed for Google Search's abuse of a dominant position in the context of the Android operating system."
The roots of this complex affair go back eight years, to 2018. The European Commission then imposed an original fine of €4.34 billion on Google, after a comprehensive investigation revealed that the company had exploited the absolute dominance of the Android operating system - which powers the vast majority of smartphones in Europe - to consolidate its position as the exclusive search engine.
According to regulators, Google forced draconian agreements on major cellphone manufacturers. As part of these agreements, the company conditioned access to its popular app store (Google Play Store) on the manufacturers pre-installing the Chrome browser and Google's search engine as a default that could not be easily changed.
In addition, the company provided financial incentives to companies that did not allow the installation of competing search engines, thereby effectively blocking any possibility for other browsers and search providers to gain significant market share.
In 2022, a lower court in the EU had already rejected most of Google's claims, but had slightly reduced the fine from €4.34 billion to €4.125 billion due to technical corrections in calculating the scope of the infringement. Google refused to give up and dragged the case to the highest court, but today, as mentioned, it suffered a complete defeat.
In an official response to the court's decision, Google expressed deep disappointment with the ruling. A company spokesperson said that the legal decision ignores the enormous investments the company has made over the years to ensure that the Android system remains open, free, and accessible to all users and developers around the world.
The company has argued throughout that its model has actually increased innovation and that end users have always been free to download competing apps independently.
In addition, in the past, the heads of the technology giant even accused the European Union of "willful blindness" towards Apple, which they claim is pursuing a much more closed and aggressive competitive policy on iPhones, without suffering similar sanctions.
The final ruling is a huge boost and a resounding strategic victory for the EU antitrust regulator. The current decision closes just one front in a series of huge fines that Google has suffered in Europe in recent years (between 2017 and 2019 alone, the company accumulated fines of over €8 billion, including fines for its shopping and advertising services).
Google's dramatic loss today signals to other technology giants (such as Apple, Meta, and Amazon) that the European legal system is determined to enforce the new Digital Markets Act (DMA) with a heavy hand, and will not hesitate to dismantle the monopolistic power centers of the giant American companies.