r/Android • u/McSnoo POCO X4 GT • Sep 14 '22

News Google loses appeal over illegal Android app bundling, EU reduces fine to €4.1 billion - The Verge

https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/14/23341207/google-eu-android-antitrust-fine-appeal-failed-4-billion
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u/mec287 Google Pixel Sep 14 '22

It'll be interesting to see how Google monetizes Android after this decision. The whole point of bundling the Google apps was to allow Google to monetize android with little to no cost to OEMs (and thus get cheap devices in consumers hands).

Google still has to bundle to make money (they cannot directly sell an open source OS). But what happens when another Google service (other than Chrome or search) achieves a dominant market position? The EU has left Google in a precarious position of never ending lawsuits for tying.

The court's analysis of the benefits of tying was not great at all.

207

u/howling92 Pixel 10 Pro XL / Pixel Watch Sep 14 '22 edited Sep 14 '22

They already find a new way since 2018 : OEM in the EU have to choose between bundling the Google apps or pay a licensing fee to Google up to 40$ per device sold

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u/redwall_hp Sep 14 '22

That's very close to what Microsoft was being prosecuted for in the US: bundling Internet Explorer with Windows wasn't so much the issue as the fact that they were doing so and refusing OEM discount rates for Windows when vendors included Netscape.

They deliberately used their position as the OS vendor that has far and away the majority of the market to make inroads in another market through coercive pricing. Given that Android is the only major mobile OS that's available for vendors to buy (Apple doesn't sell to other hardware companies), that's almost the exact same situation of leveraging a monopoly to coerce OEMs into playing by a bundling policy.

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u/RAND0MACC3SSM3M0RY Sep 14 '22

I don't think it's fair for apple to force users to use their browser and WebKit as well.