>In particular, Google has prevented manufacturers wishing to pre-install Google apps from selling even a single smart mobile device running on alternative versions of Android that were not approved by Google (so-called "Android forks").
Sounds a lot how Microsoft abused licensing agreements with OEMs to discourage them from selling PCs not bundled with Windows.
This is a dangerous ruling that pushes the world further into the potential for trade wars by proxy.
Contrary to numerous posts-
-no, the law isn't "clear". This is an incredibly nuanced situation, and the notion that Google was just overtly flouting (ed: thx sjcsjc) the law is outright nonsense. Google has a huge litany of bad practices (I personally recently switched my daily driver to an iPhone for that reason), but simply saying "Surprise....enormous fine" is ridiculous.
-the fine is enormous. Various "well it's only a quarter's earnings across all of Google" are outrageous. Over 6 years Google spent a grand total of $1.1B in all expenses for Waymo, for instance. $5B is an enormous, enormous amount of money for any company.
I highly doubt this will be a "pay it and forget it" fine, but is going to ring across all multinationals as a warning.
The net outcome of this decision will be that nobody will create significant open platforms of this type anymore, because once you are successful you will no longer be able to have any control over the experience. Someone will always be able to find a market that you are hurting.
If you actually read the decision that's essentially their underlying complaint. They dress it up in terms about search market blah blah blah, but in the end it's really about whether Google is allowed to control the experience of Android phones that want to use the Google apps and app store or not.
Android being open at all was already a fight inside Google, this decision will essentially make it impossible for anybody win that fight in the future. I can't see why anyone would risk making an open platform again. Success only has downsides versus Apple's model.
I expect the next major player here will either sell the operating system or sell the phones, and keep the other stuff closed
This is a case of breaking a law where there was clear precedent set by the Microsoft case. Google decided it could get away with it or the cost was worth it. I'm glad the EU stands up to monopolistic practices and doesn't capitulate like in the US. Without large companies suppressing competition who knows how many other choices and products we would have?
Can anyone concisely explain what this fine is for, and also why the same wouldn't apply to Apple for iOS?
It seems to be a rehash of the issue that Microsoft faced when it only gave you Internet Explorer on install. But iOS comes with only Safari on install, and forces you to use Apple's various apps - how is this any different?
I'm having a really hard time figuring out what happy ending the EU has in mind here. Google stops licensing Android to OEMs and doubles down on Pixel. It takes them years to catch up to Apple's marking and distribution head start, if they ever do. Samsung goes back to Tizen, which nobody wants, and sales plummet. All the other Android OEMs disappear.
All we have left is Apple and the most expensive, proprietary and locked down platform in computing history. A single gatekeeper effectively controls the app space. Safari dictates what happens on the web. Who wins here except for the company that's already the richest in history?
Or, more likely, the EU keeps going down this road and tech companies eventually start treating it like the backward nanny state it is and wall it off.
Very slightly off topic but I actually think how Android handles default apps is the best of both worlds. It comes with very very good default Google Apps that work well together but it is very easy to switch out whatever you want for an alternative. How iOS handles it is the opposite. For their default apps they either straight out not allow competitors, severely limit what their competitors or (if I remember correctly) they even removed apps when a newer iOS added Apple's own version so they were now "competing".
I know that anti-trust laws are probably not applicable as Apple does have a dominant position based on total market share, but to me this practice seems far more anti-competitive. Banning competitors seems worse than fully allowing competitors but providing your own as default that can easily be changed.
IMHO, antitrust fines/penalties should change from amount of money to some other type of penalty, like temporary market exclusion/block or something, otherwise companies like Google and others can simply use its cash (that's was also made due to the unfair advantage), pay the fine and move on to the next market dominance.
They will always have cash to pay, even if the fines are higher and higher. They kind of expect for this in their long term strategic planning.
All it takes is a little thought experiment to see why this doesn't make sense:
Let's say Google didn't license Android but instead only sold their own Pixel devices and somehow managed to achieve dominant market share this way. With good marketing and multiple price points this could easily have happened. Google search is the default but users can switch it to something else. This would be fine under the current reading of the law, right? So what this ruling is effectively doing is punishing Google for trying to create an open mobile ecosystem to compete with iOS's closed approach. How is this helpful to consumers?
Feels like a lot of recent EU rulings on technology are well intentioned but actually make things worse for consumers by picking favorites and raising barriers to entry.
History is repeating itself. Only difference is that Google search and Chrome browser is not as bad as MSN and IE in former times. Why Google did not looked on how MS handled that issue when you become the market leader?
there is a lot of criticism of the EC by the HN community, but I am extremely happy to have some push-back against the oligopoly of Apple, Google, etc.
let's do apple, facebook, and amazon next.
now if we could only convince comcast to provide services to the EU....
having a small set of companies controlling everything harms all consumers.
The European law that was used to fine Google is old and Google was warned since many years ago Microsoft was fined because it used its powers to force Internet Explorer to be the only pre-installed browser on Windows.
It seems that Google knowingly broke the law.
To play devil's advocate, Google's had these rules in place since Android released. It may be hard to visualize but Android started with 0% market share like everyone else. The tools Google used in Android's early days to rein in fragmentation (meaning what the EU is fining them for today) were effective but Google was still lambasted about not doing enough back then.
The only thing that's changed from then to today is Android's market share. I'm not so sure taking away Google's ability to fight fragmentation is necessarily a good thing for consumers or developers.
As a matter of law, the EC may be right, but as a matter of user experience, the idea that the Android market suffers from not having enough OEM-installed software on devices is a bit of a stretch. In all android phones/tablets I have seen there are a few shitty OEM apps that I have never found to be even close in quality to the google versions.
The EC claims that google have "denied European consumers the benefits of effective competition in the important mobile sphere", but I fear this will mean that cheap Android phones will have a shitty OEM-branded webbrowser and some random search engine link.
"Profit fell 35 percent to $12.6 billion because of the tax bill and a separate charge last summer for a $2.7 billion European Union antitrust fine, which is under appeal."
The fact that Google allows other OEMs to install their OS, as opposed to Apple which does not, is being used against them. If the lesson that Google learns is that it will kill it's OEM program then consumers will be worse off.
Google is a serial offender at this point and we are not even into GDPR territory. It seems these fines might actually be too low if they can't keep Google's hands off the cookie jar.
I feel the EU needs to educate their government. Microsoft != Google when it comes to the Android OS. Google made Android free to make cheap devices possible for everyone to be able to afford a smartphone. They include their search engine as a way to fund all of their contribution to the development of Android. Manufacturers can pay to remove Google, it's still an option for them. How is this not a trustworthy business model?
So Microsoft is out of the phone business and basically the browser business. That’s the 3rd major phone OS. The rest are Chinese and there’s a huge cultural gap for them to become competitive in Europe. Google may have stifled OS competition, but that’s a lot more difficult market to crack than hardware competition for which google provided a huge opportunity for. It’s a lot easier making a phone that you know billions of users know the OS interface for.
If I was Google, I’d use this as a perfect PR opportunity to switch gears and start charging $250 per phone for licensing Android and then offer $50 per phone to put all Google related apps on their for a net gain of $200 a phone plus their previous market share. Chrome, Google, Android are too deeply infiltrated to even effect a single percent of sales to a new OS competitor.
Then slowly eat away at the competition by producing Pixel and related models which you can beat the competition for lower and mid phones by jacking up android licensing as you eat away at the market. End result, EU users pay hundreds of more per each phone and Hardware companies die off. Apple could also further jack up their phone prices.
> Despite being a record fine, Alphabet generated about the same amount of money every 16 days in 2017, based on the company’s reported annual revenue of $110.9 billion for the year.
This one frustrated me to read, i think they should have gotten involved sooner and worked with google. Instead they slap a crazy high fee for something that is vague in violation. It does feel a bit like a vendetta here by the EU.
My company ran into this time and again, trying to get our browser pre-installed by the manufacturer only to loose the deal last minute as Google would threaten to withhold device certification if there is a different browser pre-installed (beside Google Chrome).
Google is a big bully and if you try to compete with them in an area they care about, they will use their market dominance to keep your product out. They have been deserving that fine for a long time.
I'm wondering how such a fine actually comes into existence. How does some EU committee get the idea that Google is anti-competitive here? Is this the result of lobbying by competitors? Can we somehow post the EU about instances where companies are being anti-competitive, and get them to take action somehow?
Given the enormous amount of anti-competitive behavior we see every day in the news, I can't help but feel this fine seems a bit arbitrary.
The absence of competition is a sign a free market is not working as intended. The rules and benefits of free markets ceases to apply. A monopoly is a market failure and requires intervention.
Free market advocates are always talking about regulations and the need for free markets but don't seem to care so much about monopolies, outsize profits, the accumulation of market power and its abuse that further impedes the operation of free markets and the billionaires that result.
I think this is a mistake and essentially punishing Google for pursuing an open distribution model for Android, without which I doubt it would have emerged as a serious competitor to iOS.
We're all a lot better off, even people that use iOS, because there has been real competition in mobile. This is essentially choosing which business models the EU thinks should win.
One wonders if the unintended consequence of this ruling is to further diminish competition in the smartphone space down to Apple and Google.
Google is clearly getting in to the smartphone manufacturing business with Pixel phones and their acquihire of HTC engineers.
Outside of HN, most consumers want the integrated experience offered by Apple and the default Google apps. You see this with Samsung - where consumers like the hardware but are not super keen on Samsung Apps.
The easiest way to get that integrated experience is to buy an Apple or Google device.
This is a bit over my head. How does this apply to Google but not Apple? Don't they do the exact same thing? One of the arguments I saw was Google pushed its own market over others. But Apple makes it so you can't use any other market period. So I'm confused...
So, according to the EU, it is illegal to open source OS components (thus allowing anyone to use it without further input from Google as long as the license is followed), but then close source other components and the services that drive them, although they are given out for free, but require specific licensing in the contract to distribute said free closed source components and services on their OEM devices, of which the sale of said devices does not earn Google money as they are provided to OEMs and users for free?
In addition, said closed source components and services are merely defaults, and you can install anything you want?
Example: Bing Search, Cortana with full Android Assistant support, Microsoft Launcher (which has full Bing and Cortana support, just like Pixel Launcher has for Google), and Microsoft Edge.
Further Example: TouchWiz, Bixby, Samsung Browser, Samsung App Store, Samsung Pay, Samsung Everything. If there is an AOSP/Google app, Samsung has probably replaced it with a custom app that is not based on the AOSP/Google version and has generally ruined their phones with them.
I guess the EU has to fine Microsoft and Samsung too, since they also give away closed source OS components for Android, and they can only be used with Microsoft and Samsung services... even though it is optional to use them and can be replaced with something else.
I guess the EU has to fine Apple too, since they do not allow third party components at all, all the way from third party app stores, third party browsers, or anything deemed "overlaps with functionality in iOS (retroactively as well)".
Some comments were deferred for faster rendering.
swebs|7 years ago
Sounds a lot how Microsoft abused licensing agreements with OEMs to discourage them from selling PCs not bundled with Windows.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bundling_of_Microsoft_Windows
endorphone|7 years ago
Contrary to numerous posts-
-no, the law isn't "clear". This is an incredibly nuanced situation, and the notion that Google was just overtly flouting (ed: thx sjcsjc) the law is outright nonsense. Google has a huge litany of bad practices (I personally recently switched my daily driver to an iPhone for that reason), but simply saying "Surprise....enormous fine" is ridiculous.
-the fine is enormous. Various "well it's only a quarter's earnings across all of Google" are outrageous. Over 6 years Google spent a grand total of $1.1B in all expenses for Waymo, for instance. $5B is an enormous, enormous amount of money for any company.
I highly doubt this will be a "pay it and forget it" fine, but is going to ring across all multinationals as a warning.
DannyBee|7 years ago
If you actually read the decision that's essentially their underlying complaint. They dress it up in terms about search market blah blah blah, but in the end it's really about whether Google is allowed to control the experience of Android phones that want to use the Google apps and app store or not. Android being open at all was already a fight inside Google, this decision will essentially make it impossible for anybody win that fight in the future. I can't see why anyone would risk making an open platform again. Success only has downsides versus Apple's model. I expect the next major player here will either sell the operating system or sell the phones, and keep the other stuff closed
maym86|7 years ago
vivan|7 years ago
It seems to be a rehash of the issue that Microsoft faced when it only gave you Internet Explorer on install. But iOS comes with only Safari on install, and forces you to use Apple's various apps - how is this any different?
cageface|7 years ago
All we have left is Apple and the most expensive, proprietary and locked down platform in computing history. A single gatekeeper effectively controls the app space. Safari dictates what happens on the web. Who wins here except for the company that's already the richest in history?
Or, more likely, the EU keeps going down this road and tech companies eventually start treating it like the backward nanny state it is and wall it off.
theBobBob|7 years ago
I know that anti-trust laws are probably not applicable as Apple does have a dominant position based on total market share, but to me this practice seems far more anti-competitive. Banning competitors seems worse than fully allowing competitors but providing your own as default that can easily be changed.
innerspirit|7 years ago
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/10/googles-iron-grip-on...
menegattig|7 years ago
They will always have cash to pay, even if the fines are higher and higher. They kind of expect for this in their long term strategic planning.
kyrra|7 years ago
cageface|7 years ago
Let's say Google didn't license Android but instead only sold their own Pixel devices and somehow managed to achieve dominant market share this way. With good marketing and multiple price points this could easily have happened. Google search is the default but users can switch it to something else. This would be fine under the current reading of the law, right? So what this ruling is effectively doing is punishing Google for trying to create an open mobile ecosystem to compete with iOS's closed approach. How is this helpful to consumers?
Feels like a lot of recent EU rulings on technology are well intentioned but actually make things worse for consumers by picking favorites and raising barriers to entry.
therealmarv|7 years ago
appleflaxen|7 years ago
let's do apple, facebook, and amazon next.
now if we could only convince comcast to provide services to the EU....
having a small set of companies controlling everything harms all consumers.
mhkool|7 years ago
Andrex|7 years ago
The only thing that's changed from then to today is Android's market share. I'm not so sure taking away Google's ability to fight fragmentation is necessarily a good thing for consumers or developers.
It'll certainly please OEMs and telcos, though.
luispedrocoelho|7 years ago
The EC claims that google have "denied European consumers the benefits of effective competition in the important mobile sphere", but I fear this will mean that cheap Android phones will have a shitty OEM-branded webbrowser and some random search engine link.
TekMol|7 years ago
The stock is down about 1%. Not much considering that $5B should be about 1/3 of Googles yearly earnings.
On the other hand, 1% of Googles stock is about $8B. From that viewpoint, one might think it has come unanticipated.
Then again, stocks rise and fall 1% all the time. So it's hard to read something into it.
Is this the same case as reported in January here?
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-alphabet-results/alphabet...
"Profit fell 35 percent to $12.6 billion because of the tax bill and a separate charge last summer for a $2.7 billion European Union antitrust fine, which is under appeal."
guelo|7 years ago
a_imho|7 years ago
radium3d|7 years ago
propman|7 years ago
If I was Google, I’d use this as a perfect PR opportunity to switch gears and start charging $250 per phone for licensing Android and then offer $50 per phone to put all Google related apps on their for a net gain of $200 a phone plus their previous market share. Chrome, Google, Android are too deeply infiltrated to even effect a single percent of sales to a new OS competitor.
Then slowly eat away at the competition by producing Pixel and related models which you can beat the competition for lower and mid phones by jacking up android licensing as you eat away at the market. End result, EU users pay hundreds of more per each phone and Hardware companies die off. Apple could also further jack up their phone prices.
minxomat|7 years ago
> Despite being a record fine, Alphabet generated about the same amount of money every 16 days in 2017, based on the company’s reported annual revenue of $110.9 billion for the year.
bwb|7 years ago
iowahansen|7 years ago
Google is a big bully and if you try to compete with them in an area they care about, they will use their market dominance to keep your product out. They have been deserving that fine for a long time.
nxoxn|7 years ago
amelius|7 years ago
Given the enormous amount of anti-competitive behavior we see every day in the news, I can't help but feel this fine seems a bit arbitrary.
throw2016|7 years ago
Free market advocates are always talking about regulations and the need for free markets but don't seem to care so much about monopolies, outsize profits, the accumulation of market power and its abuse that further impedes the operation of free markets and the billionaires that result.
cageface|7 years ago
We're all a lot better off, even people that use iOS, because there has been real competition in mobile. This is essentially choosing which business models the EU thinks should win.
loourr|7 years ago
wstrange|7 years ago
Google is clearly getting in to the smartphone manufacturing business with Pixel phones and their acquihire of HTC engineers.
Outside of HN, most consumers want the integrated experience offered by Apple and the default Google apps. You see this with Samsung - where consumers like the hardware but are not super keen on Samsung Apps.
The easiest way to get that integrated experience is to buy an Apple or Google device.
Kocrachon|7 years ago
DiabloD3|7 years ago
In addition, said closed source components and services are merely defaults, and you can install anything you want?
Example: Bing Search, Cortana with full Android Assistant support, Microsoft Launcher (which has full Bing and Cortana support, just like Pixel Launcher has for Google), and Microsoft Edge.
Further Example: TouchWiz, Bixby, Samsung Browser, Samsung App Store, Samsung Pay, Samsung Everything. If there is an AOSP/Google app, Samsung has probably replaced it with a custom app that is not based on the AOSP/Google version and has generally ruined their phones with them.
I guess the EU has to fine Microsoft and Samsung too, since they also give away closed source OS components for Android, and they can only be used with Microsoft and Samsung services... even though it is optional to use them and can be replaced with something else.
I guess the EU has to fine Apple too, since they do not allow third party components at all, all the way from third party app stores, third party browsers, or anything deemed "overlaps with functionality in iOS (retroactively as well)".
frockington|7 years ago
phront|7 years ago
jaimex2|7 years ago
Nothing they provide really mandates they have a physical presence.