European justice inflicted a stinging setback on the American Internet giant Google by confirming on Wednesday a record fine imposed in 2018 by Brussels for abuse of a dominant position in its Android operating system.
“The action brought by Google is essentially dismissed,” announced the General Court, based in Luxembourg. However, he deemed it “appropriate” to reduce the amount of the sanction from 4.3 to 4.1 billion euros “in order to better take into account the gravity and the duration of the infringement”, he said. explained in a press release.
Even reduced, this fine remains the highest ever imposed by the European Commission, which monitors the proper functioning of competition rules within the single market.
This decision is a judgment rendered in first instance and may be appealed within two months.
“We are disappointed that the court did not overturn the decision in its entirety. Android has created more choices for everyone […] and supports thousands of companies in Europe and around the world, ”responded Google, which contests any anti-competitive practice.
The group did not immediately specify whether it was considering an appeal to the Court of Justice of the EU, the highest European court.
For its part, the Commission said “to take note of the judgment”, noting that it had “largely confirmed (his) fine”.
Brussels accuses Google of having forced manufacturers of telephones and tablets using its operating system to preinstall its search engine and its Chrome browser to eliminate competitors. He would have abused the strike force of his Android system used on 80% of mobile devices in the world.
The EU court confirmed that Google had “imposed unlawful restrictions […] in order to consolidate the dominant position of its search engine”.
The Mountain View (California) group, however, believes that the EU has wrongly ignored competitor Apple, which favors its own services on its iPhones, such as the Safari browser. “The Commission has turned a blind eye to the real competitive dynamics of this sector, that which opposes Apple and Android”, explained the group’s lawyer, during a hearing last year.
Google had also argued that the download of competing applications was accessible with a single click and that customers were in no way forced to use its products on Android.
“Victory for the Commission”
Wednesday’s judgment is “a victory for the Commission […]. Google can no longer impose its will on phone manufacturers, ”said Thomas Vinje, lawyer for FairSearch, an organization bringing together competitors who launched the case with a complaint in 2013.
This file is one of the three major disputes opened by Brussels against Google, whose practices are also disputed in the United States and Asia.
In 2017, the Commission imposed a fine of 2.4 billion euros on the technology giant for anti-competitive practices in the price comparison market. This fine was confirmed in January by the EU court. Google then announced that it was appealing.
In 2019, the European executive had still claimed 1.5 billion euros from Google for infringements of competition attributed to its AdSense advertising management.
On the other hand, European justice had canceled in June a fine of nearly one billion euros against the mobile telephony equipment manufacturer Qualcomm, after having already canceled in January a sanction of 1.06 billion euros against the chipmaker Intel electronics.
Frustrated by the endless litigation against the digital giants, the EU has devised new legislation to curb abuses of dominant position by the Silicon Valley giants.
The Digital Markets Act (DMA), which is due to come into force next year, will impose a series of upstream obligations and prohibitions on groups such as Google, Apple, Meta (Facebook) and Amazon. It aims to act before abusive behavior has destroyed competition.