Google, has been fined £3.8 billion for breaching EU antitrust rules. The US tech giant has been found to have abused the dominant position of its Android Operating System in the mobile phone market, and essentially muscled competition out of the market.

This represents the largest fine that the European Commission (EC) has ever served to an organisation, far surpassing fines handed to Microsoft, Facebook and even Google’s previous record-breaking fine.

Abuse of Power

The European Commission says Google abused its market dominance through bundling both its search engine and Chrome apps in the Android operating system.

Margrethe Vestager, the EC’s Commissioner for Competition, outlined the case against Google, stating that the firm required manufacturers to pre-install the Google search and browser apps on Android phones – or else they would not be allowed to use Google Play.

Additionally, Google was found to have paid manufacturers and network operators to ensure that only Google’s search app was installed on a device. Through this, the company has proved to be highly restrictive to the development of competing mobile phone operating systems – which may have provided rival engines with a platform.

At today’s hearing, she said: “Google has used Android as a vehicle to cement its dominance as a search engine. These practices have denied rivals a chance to innovate and to compete on merit.

She added: “They have denied European consumers the benefit of effective competition in the very important mobile sphere, and this is illegal under EU antitrust laws.”

Under the Spotlight

Google has been under intense scrutiny from the European Commission over the past years amid growing complaints from rivals that it had been abusing its market dominance. Former Microsoft CEO, Steve Ballmer, labelled Google a “monopoly” several years ago and suggested that authorities take a harder approach to dealing with the firm.

This fine far eclipses the firm’s previous record-breaking fine of €2.2 billion from last year. Google is still in the process of appealing the judgement in what has been a continual mud-slinging contest that’s expected to linger on for years.

On this occasion, however, Google will have to move fast. Commissioner Vestager said the firm must make amends within a period of 90 days or else incur costly penalty payments.

“Google must now bring the conduct effectively to an end within 90 days or face penalty payments of up to 5% of the average daily worldwide turnover of Alphabet, Google’s parent company”, the EU said.

Facebook, Intel and Microsoft have all been handed huge fines by the Commission and Apple was famously ordered to pay back over $15 billion in taxes to the EU.

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