Google’s lawsuit against the EU Commission’s billion-euro fine has resulted in a small reduction in the fine. The General Court of the European Union in Luxembourg confirmed the decision of the EU Commission from 2018 on Wednesday. However, it reduced the penalty slightly from 4.34 to around 4.1 billion euros.
The Brussels authority accuses Google of having unfairly secured the market position of its online offers on Android smartphones against competitors. The EU Commission found in 2018 that the Internet company had imposed illegal regulations on smartphone manufacturers and mobile network operators for the use of Android and required them to pre-install certain Google apps. “In this way, Google used Android to consolidate the market dominance of its search engine,” said EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, explaining the decision at the time. Google immediately announced that it wanted to contest the fine.
The US group is in a clinch with the EU competition watchdogs on a number of issues. It was not until 2021 that a Luxembourg EU court confirmed a billion-euro fine by the Brussels competition authorities against the US technology group. In this case, they came to the conclusion that the company had given its own price comparison service “Google Shopping” an unlawful advantage.