After calling Google a “monopolist” last year, US Judge Amit Mehta in the next few days is expected to deliver a judgement on the proposed remedies address the problem. In two separate cases in the United States in 2024 and 2025, courts held that Google monopolised key digital advertising technologies, and violated antitrust law by monopolising open-web digital advertising markets, respectively. Subsequently, the US Department of Justice (DoJ) advocated selling Google’s popular Chrome browser, among other things, even as Google resisted major changes to the existing model. The upcoming judgment will consider the solutions suggested by the DoJ to curb Google’s monopoly. Its effects may be felt across the world, including in India. Here is what to know. Why did the US govt sue Google? In recent years, US government agencies have filed cases against several big tech companies, such as Amazon, Meta and Google, accusing them of stifling competition for other market players. The DoJ and several US states sued Google in 2020 for illegally cementing its dominance, in part by annually paying the likes of Apple and Samsung billions of dollars to have Google automatically handle search queries on smartphones and web browsers. In August 2024, Judge Mehta delivered a landmark verdict which paved the way for subsequent action to address the issue of market dominance. Specifically, he told the DoJ and the states that brought the antitrust case (including California, Colorado, New Jersey and New York) to submit solutions to correct Google’s search monopoly. What did the DoJ and the states suggest? The DoJ and the states said in a petition last year that to reverse the effects of Google’s monopolistic behaviour, the solutions “must enable and encourage the development of an unfettered search ecosystem that induces entry, competition, and innovation as rivals vie to win the business of consumers and advertisers.” Their proposal discussed the possibility of Google divesting from Android, the mobile operating system that runs on the smartphones of major companies, such as Samsung, Xiaomi, Moto, etc. This would prevent Google from using Android to “exclude rival search providers” since the phones currently have Google Chrome as the default search engine. It further suggested that Google should be banned from entering into exclusive agreements with content publishers (such as news websites) and from acquiring its competitors or potential competitors in the general search domain without prior approval. During the final arguments this year, the DoJ also argued that Google could use its artificial intelligence products to strengthen its monopoly in web search and take the data from its powerful search index to dominate AI, according to an NPR report. “Google’s search index is essentially an enormous database of information from billions of webpages,” the report said. Therefore, the remedies must also extend to AI, the DoJ said. And how has Google responded? In a blog last year, Google parent company Alphabet’s Chief Legal Officer Kent Walker called the proposal “staggering” and one that pushes a “radical interventionist agenda”. He said, “DoJ’s approach would result in unprecedented government overreach that would harm American consumers, developers, and small businesses — and jeopardise America’s global economic and technological leadership at precisely the moment it’s needed most.” The company has also argued that the emergence of AI models like ChatGPT, Perplexity and DeepSeek indicated a competitive environment. This year, Google’s attorney argued in court that the data privacy of Chrome’s billions of users will be at risk if some other company takes over. NPR reported the DoJ as countering the view that only Google could keep Chrome safe. Lee-Anne Mulholland, the Vice President for Google’s Regulatory Affairs, wrote in April that the DoJ’s proposal would make it harder for people to get the services they prefer. “People use Google because they want to, not because they have to,” she said. Google’s own proposals include giving smartphone makers “additional flexibility” in preloading multiple search engines on the devices, rather than only Chrome. So what happens now? There was some concern earlier about the continuity of the case under a new government after the presidential elections, but the Trump administration has supported checking Google’s influence. A Fortune report recently estimated the broader possible impact on a company like Apple, which Google pays between $15 billion and $20 billion per year to ensure its search engine is the default on Apple devices. The full impact depends on the kind of remedies that are eventually ordered, even though Google will likely legally challenge them. India, meanwhile, has had its own regulatory proceedings against Google in recent years. In October 2022, the Competition Commission of India imposed a penalty of Rs 1,337 crore on Google. It held that mandatory pre-installation of the Google Mobile Suite (Google Search, YouTube, Gmail, etc.) on Android devices with no option to uninstall the apps was an abuse of Google’s dominant market position. Following this verdict, Google announced that it would allow Indian users to choose a default search engine. While Judge Mehta’s 2024 judgment limited itself to the “relevant geographic market” of the United States, and India does have other smartphone brands with their own browser offerings (such as Xiaomi and Opera), Google still holds a significant position here. The Google experience in the US could thus impact how regulators deal with it elsewhere.
