U.S. v. Google: What to Know About the Biggest Antitrust Trial in 20 Years
Search engine faces charges of using illegal agreements with partners such as Apple to maintain a monopoly
Google, the country’s dominant search engine, faces its biggest legal threat ever this week when the company goes on civil trial in Washington on allegations of violating U.S. antitrust laws.
The Justice Department’s case is aimed at Google search, and whether the company has used illegal agreements to sideline its rivals and harmed consumers and advertisers in the process. Google pays billions of dollars to Apple, for example, to be the default search engine on the Safari browser.
Alphabet GOOG 0.39%increase; green up pointing triangle-owned Google grew up during an era of more relaxed antitrust enforcement, particularly against technology companies that developed innovative—and often free—ways to explore and use the internet. Efforts to regulate Google and other technology giants have failed to advance in Congress in recent years. In the absence of such rules, the government is trying to use antitrust law to govern competition on the web and put curbs on the internet’s gatekeepers. Here are some crucial questions about the biggest U.S. antitrust trial since the government challenged Microsoft more than 20 years ago.
Why is Google facing an antitrust lawsuit?
The Justice Department and a group of states sued Google three years ago, alleging it illegally maintains a monopoly in online search and related advertising markets. Google has about a 90% market share in search and maintains its dominance through restrictive agreements with browser and phone partners such as Apple, Mozilla, Samsung and Verizon, according to the Justice Department. These deals, which the government says are illegal, make Google the default search engine on most U.S. phones. Google’s separate agreements with Android-based mobile-device manufacturers forbid pre-installing or promoting rival search engines if they opt to take a cut of Google’s search revenue.
What harm comes from Google’s agreements?
The Justice Department argues that Google’s exclusive deals with Apple and others prevent rivals from effectively competing for search business or improving their products. Because Google locks up all the browsers and gets all the queries, other companies such as Microsoft can’t perform enough searches to improve their product, the government says, giving it an anticompetitive scale advantage. Google’s agreements also stifle innovation, the Justice Department says, because the company doesn’t have to improve its search engine to maintain market share. Finally, Google has used its monopoly to raise prices for advertising on its search-results pages, according to the government.
How does Google explain the deals?
Google says its deals with Apple and others promote competition by supplying browser providers with what they want: a single default search option for customers. Apple and Mozilla chose Google because it continues to outstrip rival search engines, and not because they are coerced by revenue sharing or other inducements, it says. Windows users, who don’t have any Google products preloaded on their personal computers, generally opt for Google search because it is the best way to explore the internet, the company says.
Google also points out that its agreements don’t prevent its partners from offering other search engines, because users of Apple’s Safari or Mozilla’s Firefox browsers can change the default search option in their settings. And on Android phones, Google says, consumers can switch away from its preloaded search engine to other products on their own; the fact that few do so isn’t evidence of exclusionary practice, Google says, but of consumers sticking with a superior product.
What happens if Google loses?
In theory, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta could order Google broken up but legal analysts consider that unlikely. More possible, they say, are new constraints on how Google does business, such as its ability to pay Apple, Samsung and others to be the default search engine on phones. “That seems like the most natural remedy,” said Paul Gallant, a tech-policy analyst at Cowen Washington Research Group. “Breaking up the company over unlawful payments to equipment manufacturers seems unlikely relative to the harm.”
When did the U.S. government last challenge a big monopoly in court?
The government sued Microsoft in 1998 over its attempt to control the market for internet browsers on Windows computers. The Justice Department prevailed in the lawsuit, which created an opening for rivals such as Google and Facebook to flourish in the future, according to the DOJ. The Justice Department says Google has emulated Microsoft’s 1990s playbook to build and maintain its own monopoly in internet search and advertising, while Google says the comparison is inapt.
How long will the trial last and when will a verdict be reached?
The Justice Department has one month to present its case, meaning the states and Google won’t question witnesses until October. Witness testimony is expected to conclude in November, and then the two sides will write briefs to the judge summarizing the case and arguing which way he should rule. Closing arguments and a judgment aren’t expected until next year. If Judge Mehta finds that Google violated the Sherman Antitrust Act, he would schedule a separate trial to decide penalties. The decision is likely to be appealed, so the final outcome might be years away.
Who are the key witnesses in the trial?
While a complete witness list isn’t available yet, Alphabet Chief Executive Sundar Pichai and some Apple executives, such as Eddy Cue, senior vice president of services, are likely to be questioned. The Justice Department is likely to call executives from Microsoft and DuckDuckGo, which operate competing search engines.
Who are the key lawyers working on the case?
Google’s principal trial lawyer is John Schmidtlein, a partner at litigation powerhouse Williams & Connolly. Schmidtlein represented a group of states in part of the 1998 trial against Microsoft. Google Chief Legal Officer Kent Walker and Susan Creighton, a partner at the Silicon Valley law firm Wilson Sonsini, have played key roles in dealing with the Justice Department and shaping trial strategy.
The Justice Department’s top lawyer in the courtroom is Kenneth Dintzer, a 30-year veteran of high-stakes government litigation. Dintzer began his DOJ career in the early 1990s and worked on the early Microsoft investigation. His trial colleagues include Adam Severt, Meagan Bellshaw and David Dahlquist.