Tech giants and antitrust violations: Google is not the first and it will not be the last

In news that appeared to make headlines worldwide, Google was slapped with a $2.7 billion fine for systematically giving importance to its own shopping service and demoting rival comparison shopping services in its search results.

At the European Commission’s (EC) press conference, competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager could not make her statements any clearer, “Google has given its own comparison shopping service an illegal advantage by abusing its dominance in general Internet search. It has promoted its own service, and demoted rival services. It has harmed competition and consumers. That’s illegal under EU antitrust rules.”

“What Google has done is illegal under EU antitrust rules. It denied other companies the chance to compete on the merits and to innovate. And most importantly, it denied European consumers a genuine choice of services and the full benefits of innovation,” she said.

Google has been given 90 days to change the way it operates or face some additional penalties which would be similar to what the EC charged social media networks, not too long ago. In Google’s case, the EC has asked for 5 per cent of the company’s average daily worldwide turnover of Alphabet, its parent company not once, but for each day of its non-compliance.

Google has been fined on two fronts. The first one is for systematically giving importance to its own comparison shopping service while the second one deals with demoting other (rival) shopping services in its search results.

Google’s SVP and General Counsel Kent Walker commented on the EC’s statement saying, “We respectfully disagree with the conclusions announced today. We will review the Commission’s decision in detail as we consider an appeal, and we look forward to continuing to make our case.”

In short Google’s idea behind the same was give its customers that best search results and find what they looking for “quickly and easily”.

While the fine imposed on Google is a large sum, this is not the first time, we have heard of antitrust violations of epic proportions.

The European Commission has been actively monitoring a number of American technology companies over the years. But when it comes to antitrust violations Google indeed seems to be on top of the EC’s list of violators.

While the Google is currently battling the EC for its shopping mess up, there have been many other cases and related companies that are fighting and have fought the EC in antitrust cases in the past.

Google AdSense

Back in July 2016, the Commission had sent out two statements  of objections to the search giant. One of these included the comparison shopping problem while the second was it AdSense network.

The EC accused Google of placing restrictions on the ability of certain third-party websites to display search advertisements from Google competitors. It claimed that Google had these rules in place to “protect its dominant position in online search advertising.”

Google was accused of violating antitrust policies by “preventing existing and potential competitors, including other search providers and online advertising platforms, from entering and growing in this commercially important area.”

Android

Apart from the European Commission, Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) too had called Google on grounds of violating local competition rules. The antitrust case which was originally filed in September, 2015 by Russian search rival Yandex was settled for $7.8 million. The filing pointed out how Google had made it mandatory for handset makers to pre-load their devices with Google apps, one of which was also Google Search app. As per a Reuters report, the settlement was made privately and out of court. A similar investigation was also conducted by the EC in April, 2016.

Microsoft Windows Media Player and Internet Explorer

Another landmark antitrust case dug up by the Commission involved another tech giant, Microsoft. In a complaint first files by Sun Microsystems back in 1998, the complainant pointed out the lack of disclosure of the interfaces to Windows NT. Upon examination the EU pointed out how Microsoft used streaming media technologies and how deeply these were integrated into Windows using it proprietary Windows Media Player.

In a preliminary decision, the EU stated that Microsoft had abused it power and ordered the software giant to offer two versions of Windows, one with the Windows Media Player built-in and the other without it. The decision also stated that the version without the Windows Media Player should also pack in the necessary information and that it should be enough to allow competing networking software to be integrated and fully interact with Windows desktops and servers.

In 2004, the EU ordered Microsoft to pay $794 milllion, its largest fine ever (back then) and gave the company 120 days to divulge server information and 90 days to ready a version of Windows without its Media Player. Microsoft complied and produced a copy of Windows called Windows XP N. The tech giant also released source code on the final day of the deadline, but it lacked the specifications needed.

On February 2008 the EU slapped an  899 million euros  ($1.35 billion) for failure to comply with the 2004 case.

In 2013, another fine was of 561 million euros ($731 million) imposed on the software giant, for failing to comply to the EC’s ruling where it had to allow users to easily choose a preferred web browser of their choice over the default Internet Explorer. Microsoft had reportedly not offered this choice to 15 million of its Windows users between 2011 and 2012 leading to the fine.

Intel

In June 2014 US chipmaker Intel too lost its case against the EU against a record fine of $1.4 billion. The case was a major one that took off in 2009 where Intel was accused of thwarting chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) by handing out rebates to computer manufacturers like Dell, HP, NEC and Lenovo to buy their computer chips from them.