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EU competition chief holds threat of breaking up Google

telegraph.co.uk

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Re: EU competition chief holds threat of breaking up Google

#21

Post by LifeLiverTransp »

citilife wrote: post #9
tbirrell wrote: post #3

Does the EU even have the authority to break up Google/Alphabet?

I don't think they really can. Effectively, they'd have to block Google in the EU. Otherwise, Google can technically just stay in the U.S. and sell services. Ad's don't have to be location based, pretty sure a lot of advertising is elicit materials (such as porn) anyway - which already may not be allowed. Unless you stop people from just heading to the top search engine in the world, they'll keep using it.

Blocking companys and growing ones own version of them, worked well for nearly every country who did it. (China, South Korea, Japan). Its a miracle the EU did this not earlier, and i guess Trumps punitive tariffs encourage dreams in some well-bribed politicians, to look for new sources of income by growing there own it-giants.

Re: EU competition chief holds threat of breaking up Google

#22

Post by taoistextremist »

mehrdadn wrote: post #15
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EU effectively has the authority to decide who can do business in Europe. So Google/Alphabet presumably could refuse an EU breakup order, but they'd have to more or less exit business in Europe, including all of their various offices there. Both a lot of profit and talent left on the table. Someone much smarter than me would likely have to determine whether stockholders benefit more from a split up company that c…

What happens to people's emails in Gmail if they exit business in Europe? Surely people won't just be cool with their leaders making them lose access to their emails? EDIT: I guess I didn't mean "what if Google was forced to do this overnight?", but rather I meant more like "couldn't Google make this backfire by doing this overnight?".

I think it would be more like Google couldn't sell advertising to European companies, nor provide other paid services like licensing and the sort.

Re: EU competition chief holds threat of breaking up Google

#23

Post by qeternity »

flexie wrote: post #19
Retric wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The political backlash could make such a withdrawal rather temporary. Which would IMO push Google into staging such a withdrawal.

What backlash? Save from a well run PR and lobby campaign by Google, few consumers would mind.

What percent of the EU uses Gmail? Right off that bat, that's a massive inconvenience.

Re: EU competition chief holds threat of breaking up Google

#24

Post by mbel »

mehrdadn wrote: post #15
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EU effectively has the authority to decide who can do business in Europe. So Google/Alphabet presumably could refuse an EU breakup order, but they'd have to more or less exit business in Europe, including all of their various offices there. Both a lot of profit and talent left on the table. Someone much smarter than me would likely have to determine whether stockholders benefit more from a split up company that c…

What happens to people's emails in Gmail if they exit business in Europe? Surely people won't just be cool with their leaders making them lose access to their emails? EDIT: I guess I didn't mean "what if Google was forced to do this overnight?", but rather I meant more like "couldn't Google make this backfire by doing this overnight?".

It probably wouldn't happen over night, there would be some time to get data out of google. Taking into account that gmail is still accessible by IMAP I guess there would be a plenty of other providers who would offer transfer of your emails from Google to a new email account.

Re: EU competition chief holds threat of breaking up Google

#25

Post by dmitrygr »

matthewmacleod wrote: post #12
dcgudeman wrote: post #2

Honestly comes across as EU sour grapes. The "competition chief" should focus on the regulations that have resulted in low investment and slow innovation instead of trying to "regulate" American tech companies.

Which regulations have "resulted in low investment and slow innovation"?

High tax rate and difficulty of firing someone would be my two guesses

Re: EU competition chief holds threat of breaking up Google

#26

Post by milesward »

jacquesm wrote: post #13
adventured wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Symmetry was fining Google. The EU fined Google $2.7 billion. What would symmetry look like from the US side if the EU starts demanding Google be broken up? Unfortunately the EU has no massive, powerful technology businesses to demand be broken up.

> Unfortunately the EU has no massive, powerful technology businesses to demand be broken up. So? If it had then most likely there would be a similarly strong push to break up such a company if it misbehaved. At least, I would hope so. Microsoft got very lucky with the change of party in charge, they were about to be broken up in the US into 'apps' and 'os'. And that's a good punishment for companies that use the fac…

SAP?

Re: EU competition chief holds threat of breaking up Google

#27

Post by Slansitartop »

qeternity wrote: post #23
flexie wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What backlash? Save from a well run PR and lobby campaign by Google, few consumers would mind.

What percent of the EU uses Gmail? Right off that bat, that's a massive inconvenience.

Could such a breakup order or sanctions be specific to certain businesses?

Google has a strong position in the email space, but it isn't anywhere as dominant as it is with search and web advertising.

Re: EU competition chief holds threat of breaking up Google

#28

Post by idbehold »

flexie wrote: post #19
Retric wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The political backlash could make such a withdrawal rather temporary. Which would IMO push Google into staging such a withdrawal.

What backlash? Save from a well run PR and lobby campaign by Google, few consumers would mind.

You're kidding, right? You don't think people would be upset when they cannot access Gmail, Google search results, or Google Maps? And a message in each service asking users to contact their representatives if they want access to the services again would be all that is required.

Re: EU competition chief holds threat of breaking up Google

#29

Post by kokx »

citilife wrote: post #9
tbirrell wrote: post #3

Does the EU even have the authority to break up Google/Alphabet?

I don't think they really can. Effectively, they'd have to block Google in the EU. Otherwise, Google can technically just stay in the U.S. and sell services. Ad's don't have to be location based, pretty sure a lot of advertising is elicit materials (such as porn) anyway - which already may not be allowed. Unless you stop people from just heading to the top search engine in the world, they'll keep using it.

There are several things the EU can do. First of all, they can freeze and/or seize Google's assets in Europe. Like bank accounts and real estate. Or even more important to Google, all of their European datacenters.

The EU can also disallow sales of Google's products, like any android phone. Or products like the chromecast, and don't forget Nest and Google Home.

And selling ads in Europe from a foreign country isn't too easy either. It is a lot harder to do business with a company which is on the other side of the ocean, and officially doesn't have a precense in the same economic area.

If Google leaves all of that behind in Europe, and is not really allowed to do business in Europe anymore, soon enough there will be a competitor that stands up and can do things better. Especially if they can actually open offices in Europe and do business without major hurdles.

Re: EU competition chief holds threat of breaking up Google

#30

Post by throwaway4719 »

mehrdadn wrote: post #15
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EU effectively has the authority to decide who can do business in Europe. So Google/Alphabet presumably could refuse an EU breakup order, but they'd have to more or less exit business in Europe, including all of their various offices there. Both a lot of profit and talent left on the table. Someone much smarter than me would likely have to determine whether stockholders benefit more from a split up company that c…

What happens to people's emails in Gmail if they exit business in Europe? Surely people won't just be cool with their leaders making them lose access to their emails? EDIT: I guess I didn't mean "what if Google was forced to do this overnight?", but rather I meant more like "couldn't Google make this backfire by doing this overnight?".

That's one part of the negotiation puzzle. EU would want it's citizens to retain access to their google-hosted emails.

Legally speaking, I'm sure there's plenty of ways the EU can force Google to do things it currently does not want to do.

I'd say the EU has lots of negotional angles currently to win things from Google. That is kind of what you get when you have more or less universal legislation power over 40% or so of the world's purchasing power (please correct me, I just bullshitted that guess). And that, alas, was also a large part of why the EU was born. So now we'll will reap the benefits.

If I could say anything to our EU negotiators in this case, it would be: stay brave.

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