Epic Games emerges victorious in antitrust lawsuit against Google regarding obstacles to its Android app store

A major setback has been dealt to Google’s technology empire as a federal court jury has ruled that the company’s Android app store has been shielded by unfair barriers, causing harm to smartphone consumers and software developers.

Monday’s unanimous verdict came after just three hours of deliberation following a four-week trial that revolved around the Google Play Store’s lucrative payment system. The store is the main place where hundreds of millions of people around the world download and install apps that run on smartphones running Google’s Android software.

Epic Games, the maker of the popular Fortnite video game, filed a lawsuit against Google three years ago, alleging that the Internet search giant has abused its power to shield its Play Store from competition to protect its billion-making gold mines. dollars annually. Just like Apple does with its iPhone app store, Google collects a 15-30 percent commission on digital transactions made in its apps.

Apple won a similar case brought by Epic against the iPhone app store. But that 2021 trial was settled by a federal judge in a ruling that is being appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The nine-person jury in the Play Store case apparently saw things through a different lens, even though Google technically allows Android apps to be downloaded from different stores — an option Apple forbids on the iPhone.

Just before the Play Store trial began, Google sought to avoid having a jury decide the outcome, but U.S. District Judge James Donato rejected that request. Now it is Donato’s task to decide what measures Google must take to dismantle its illegal activities in the Play Store. The judge announced that he would hold hearings on the matter in the second week of January.

Epic CEO Tim Sweeney grinned widely after reading the verdict and patted his lawyers on the back, also shaking hands with Google’s lawyer, whom he thanked for his professional attitude during the trial.

“Victory to Google!” Sweeney wrote in the post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. In a company message, Epic hailed the ruling as “a victory for all app developers and consumers around the world.”

Google plans to appeal the verdict, says Wilson White, the company’s vice president for board affairs and general policy.

“Android and Google Play offer more choice and openness than any other major mobile platform,” said White.

Depending on how the judge enforces the jury’s verdict, Google could lose billions of dollars in annual profits from its Play Store fees. The trial’s outcome won’t directly affect the company’s main source of revenue — digital advertising tied mostly to its search engine, Gmail and other services.

The jury made its decision after listening to two hours of closing arguments from the lawyers of the opposing sides of the case.

Epic attorney Gary Bornstein described Google as a ruthless bully that uses a “bribe and block” strategy to prevent competition from its Play Store for Android apps. Google lawyer Jonathan Kravis attacked Epic as a self-interested game maker trying to use the courts to save money while undermining the ecosystem that has spawned billions of Android smartphones to compete against Apple and its iPhone.

Most of the lawyers’ dueling arguments involved the testimony of a litany of witnesses who came to court during the trial.

Key witnesses included Google CEO Sundar Pichai, who at times looked like a professor explaining complex topics while standing behind a lectern due to a health problem, and Sweeney, who painted himself as a video game lover on a mission to bring down the greedy tech titan. .

In his final Epic argument, Bornstein chided Google for using its power over Android software in a way that “has led to higher prices for developers and consumers, and less innovation and quality.”

Google has staunchly defended the bounties as a way to recoup the more than $40 billion it has spent building Android software, which it has doled out since 2007 to manufacturers to compete against the iPhone.

“Android phones can’t compete against the iPhone without a great app store,” Kravis asserted in his closing remarks. “The competition between app stores is tied to the competition between phones.”

But Bornstein scoffed at the notion of Google and Android competing with Apple and its incompatible iPhone software system. “Apple is not the ‘get out of jail free’ card that Google wants it to be,” Bornstein told the jury.

Google also pointed to competing Android app stores, such as those installed by Samsung on its popular smartphones, as evidence of a free market. Along with competing app stores that come pre-installed on other companies’ devices, more than 60% of Android phones offer alternative outlets for Android apps.

However, Epic presented evidence that reinforced the idea that Google welcomes the competition as an excuse, citing the hundreds of billions of dollars it has doled out to companies such as game maker Activision Blizzard to prevent them from opening competing app stores. In addition to those charges, Bornstein urged the jury to consider Google’s “scare screens” that pop up and warn consumers of potential security threats when they try to download Android apps from some Play Store options.

“These are classic anti-competitive strategies used by dominant companies to protect their monopoly,” Bornstein said.

Google’s empire could be further undermined by another major antitrust trial in Washington, which a federal judge will decide after hearing final arguments in May. The experiment has shone a spotlight on Google’s cozy relationship with Apple in online search, a technology that made Google a household word a few years after two former Stanford University graduate students founded the company in a Silicon Valley garage in 1998.