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European Commission fines Google €4.34B in Android antitrust case

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Re: European Commission fines Google €4.34B in Android antitrust case

#151

Post by repolfx »

blub wrote: post #118
ge0rg wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe the problem with the Google deal is that it's exclusive: if you want to make one device that's Google approved and contains the "highly valued" services, you are disallowed by the compliance contract to make other Android devices that are not Google-approved.

Yep, that is a big problem. If company A has launched an official Android device, and company B goes to A and asks them to build a totally unrelated Android-based (but not Android proper) device for them, A is not allowed to do that by Google.

But why would company B go to company A and ask them to make a phone "for them"?

It's not hard to become a phone maker these days, judging by the sheer number of Android OEMs that are out there (hundreds, I believe). If there was huge untapped demand for Android sans Google then a new company would appear, they'd download the Android code, they'd go to Shenzen and do a deal with a white label manufacturer, and they'd make such phones. Google wouldn't stop them because they'd be a company that doesn't make any other kinds of phones.

We know this is possible because there's one huge market where that's normal, China. Google's services are blocked in China anyway, so there's no point adding their app store or mapping apps. Local firms produce local versions of Android for their own market and it works fine. We also know this because Amazon tried it and they weren't sued or anything.

There are also open source spins of Android that have custom app stores like F-Droid. A new phone maker could ship those too.

Re: European Commission fines Google €4.34B in Android antitrust case

#152

Post by oblio »

rusk wrote: post #64
jaimex2 wrote: post #43

Can Google just close shop in the EU and ignore the fine? Nothing they provide really mandates they have a physical presence.

They could but they'd lose access to the economy with the largest spending power per capita in the world. Inevitably another player would spring up to feed this void and could then use that as a platform to start eating their lunch elsewhere.

Per capita the US spends more. But the EU still spends a lot and has more citizens.

Re: European Commission fines Google €4.34B in Android antitrust case

#153

Post by riffraff »

repolfx wrote: post #86
shaqbert wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The punishment is not for pursuing an open source distribution model, but by applying undue power in taking back control of the open distribution model.

But Apple hasn't been fined in the same way. So apparently if Google had kept Android proprietary, and made their own hardware, they'd be totally OK, even though there'd only be two phone makers left in the world instead of dozens like there is now? I'm sorry but this move is garbage. I am British and I'm so glad the UK is leaving this horrible, success hating farce of a union. Google paid billions to develop Android…

it seems likely that if Android wasn't "free" it would not have gained almost 100% of the market share in licensable mobile OSs, so there would still be the same amount of phone makers, but with more OS fragmentation.

Which is as it was before, of course.

Re: European Commission fines Google €4.34B in Android antitrust case

#154

Post by inapis »

rjvbk wrote: post #21
vivan wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my country, iOS are more than 50% of the market. I haven't been able to find any EU-wide numbers though, which are the important ones in this case.

http://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/europe It gets much worse depending on the country: http://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/italy http://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/spain

Is this website seriously running off of a raspberry pi? I’m getting a 404 page with Apache/2.4 (Raspbian) in the metadata.

Re: European Commission fines Google €4.34B in Android antitrust case

#155

Post by flexie »

cncrnd wrote: post #81

This line in the article got to me, "The fine would top the EU’s €2.4 billion antitrust decision against Google just over a year ago." It looks like the EU has created a piggy bank with these regulations on hostage tech corporations. I wonder how much of the large fines is attributed to prosecutors or politicians trying to make a name for themselves. Anyone know how often these record fines hold up on appeal? Edit: W…

The EU is not using Google or any other company as a piggy bank. Google is doing business in the European Union making tens of billions of dollars and they should follow the rules, just like their European, American and Asian competitors.

It's not like you have to be a legal genius to know the rules. They are right in the treaty (think of it as the EU constitution) and Google know about the many previous cases interpreting the rules that share similarity with theirs, including Microsoft's case about bundling Explorer with Windows and making it the default browser.

So Google and their hundreds of lawyers are well aware of the rules against abusing dominant position. Nevertheless, they have chosen to ignore the rules - maybe because they stood to gain so much money on breaking the rules.

When Google does business in Europe, they make use of European laws such as the trademark rights that grant them exclusivity to the brand "google", the copyright that grant them exclusivity to their source code, patent rights that grant them exclusivity to their many inventions, and hundreds of other laws that ensure that Google - just like European counterparts - can rely on the rule of law to protect them while they make money. Google itself has likely benefited tremendously from the exact same European competition law, that they are now fined for breaking. Were it not for such laws, Microsoft or Apple could and would likely have toppled Google from the advertisement market simply by forcing their own search engines, browser, maps, emails etc. on users of their operating systems.

Whether the administrative decision of the European commission to fine Google will hold up in court will be seen if Google decides not to accept the fine. So far the European Commission has had a good track record.

Re: European Commission fines Google €4.34B in Android antitrust case

#156

Post by hrktb »

repolfx wrote: post #66
hrktb wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A better source: > The European Commission has accused Google of abusing its Android market dominance by bundling its search engine and Chrome apps into the operating system. Google has also allegedly blocked phone makers from creating devices that run forked versions of Android. https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/18/17580694/google-android-e... > How is it any different Apple doesn’t have a dominent search engine to pu…

That first claim is clearly wrong though. Firstly, Android doesn't have a monopoly. Apple does fine in Europe and their devices can be bought everywhere. Secondly, there are device makers that didn't cut a deal with Google, notably the Amazon phones and tablets. They weren't that popular with consumers but that's not Google's fault: it just means consumers highly value the additional services Google provides.

Sorry if it was unclear. The first issue is Google pushing the search engine on mobile devices.

For context they also push Google search to iOS devices (Apple gets huge amount of money for that), the same way as they pay firefox to have Google as their default search engine.

The issue though, is that for android phones, it's not a "let's make a deal, we will pay you to have Google Search" attitude. You can't make an android device integrated with Google Play app store without also having Google Search in the home screen and as default search engine.

What the EU is fining among others, is the business practice of forcing device makers that want to use the Play Store to also bundle the other service (Search).

Re: European Commission fines Google €4.34B in Android antitrust case

#157

Post by garmaine »

Radle wrote: post #100
garmaine wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If so, this is a flaw. Not all businesses have the same margin.

You can hide profit on the paper, by investing it. So it is impossible to fine under consideration of profits. The only way to do is to use revenue, but judges should still consider the business profit margin.

That’s not the only way. Independent government auditors could make their own profits assessment and work off that. This is exactly what is done in other jurisdictions and other industries.

Re: European Commission fines Google €4.34B in Android antitrust case

#158

Post by Radle »

garmaine wrote: post #89
skrause wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Can Google just close shop in the EU and ignore the fine? Sure, if they don't want to get any revenue from the whole European Union anymore. Fortunately the EU is a big enough market so that Google doesn't have any leverage here.

Other commentators are saying the fine is between 1/3 to a half of google’s profits. I sincerely doubt the EU represents more than that share of google’s revenues. But of course I doubt they would pull out as this is a one time thing.

Google's profits are a bit weird right now, thanks to the new us tax law. (I wrote more about that at the end)

Their 2016 profit was $19.4 billion and without the one-time foreign asset charge it would have been $22,4 billion, as such the fine compromises less than 1/4 of googles earnings.

Their European revenue was $22.6 billion out of $90 billion total revenue for 2016.

This makes it look like an incredible high fine. It's important to notice that the revenue in Europe is mostly google ads. The total revenue for alphabet is also bloated by thing stuff like other bet, which produce $400 million revenue and $900 million loss. Or to put it more bluntly, the revenue in Europe has a stronger influence on alphabets profits than the revenue in the USA.

I still think the fine is incredible high, one reason for this might be a lack of commitment from google after they were fined for $2.4 billion last year.

This being the second time google breaks European anti trust laws. In a really short time.

Last year they were fined for what Brusels describe like this in their press released: Since the beginning of each abuse, Google's comparison shopping service has increased its traffic 45-fold in the United Kingdom, 35-fold in Germany, 19-fold in France, 29-fold in the Netherlands, 17-fold in Spain and 14-fold in Italy.

---- A bit more on why google earnings are weird: "For the quarter of 2017 that ended on December 31, 2017, it actually recorded a loss of $3 billion, but that was due to a one-time foreign assets charge due to the recently passed U.S. Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. If that is excluded, Alphabet would have had net income of $6.8 billion, up from $5.3 billion compared to a year ago. "

yearly "For the entire 2017 fiscal year, Alphabet recorded revenues of $110.8 billion, up from $90 billion in 2016. Net income was $12.6 billion for the 2017 fiscal year, compared to $19.4 billion in revenues in 2016, once again reflecting the one time charge due to the tax law change."

src: https://www.androidauthority.com/alphabet-q4-2017-earnings-8...

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/nov/04/google-pays...

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-17-1784_en.htm

Re: European Commission fines Google €4.34B in Android antitrust case

#159

Post by azernik »

heracles wrote: post #130
naturalgradient wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that antitrust laws like these are very selectively enforced. Selection and prosecution of these cases is hence inherently political as these are non-standardized arguments or verdicts.

That is a fair point, but isn't it built into this particular field? We can prosecute equally for jaywalking, but anti-competitive behavior gets worse the bigger the offender is and/or the worse offense they commit. So in that way it makes sense to prosecute "top-down", that is go after the biggest ones first. That's at least what I prefer as an EU member state citizen and consumer.

Not only does it get worse the bigger the offender is; in law, generally there are specific actions that you're not allowed to take iff you're dominant in the market.

Re: European Commission fines Google €4.34B in Android antitrust case

#160

Post by DiabloD3 »

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)".

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