We all are aware of the ongoing Android Antitrust case between Google and EU. In this case the European Commission alleged Google of having control of their Play Store in Android devices to stifle competition for search. On July 18th 2018, the European Union fined Google with $5B for favoring its own product in the smartphones.
Why Google has been accused of Android abuse?
Actually, the key issues, in this case, were the licensing terms that bounded smartphone manufacturers to pre-install Google apps especially Google Search and Google Play in Android-based devices. Google Play has been the most dominant app store for all these years, the phone makers had no choice but to accept its terms. Google has even been accused of going a step further and paying to make its search engine default in all the new devices.
What were the motives behind this abuse?
Google has lost its biggest case, but the motive of doing it in the first place is still a debatable topic. Some say that Google wanted its apps to be familiar so that users can rely on it. This argument seems valid to some extent as users will seek it out which they have used it for a long time duration. Some other theories are also in the wind that Google tried to lower the value of being default search by pre-installing apps in devices.
Well, no matter what the motives were! But, European Commission has found Google guilty for Android abuse and it will have to pay. This Android abuse case has been in the top highlights lately and now we can only wait for any further lead on the issue.
Suggested Reading: Apple should also be fined over Antitrust Abuse, know why?
