Gannett Files Antitrust Lawsuit Against Google for Alleged Monopolization of Ad Technology
Gannett, the largest news publisher in the US, has filed a lawsuit against Google for monopolistic behavior, echoing arguments made by the Department of Justice in a previous lawsuit. The suit accuses Google of monopolizing market trading to the detriment of publishers, readers, and the wider economy. Gannett CEO Mike Reed stated that digital advertising is crucial to the online economy, and without fair competition, publishers cannot invest in their newsrooms. This is the latest in a series of lawsuits against Google.
Gannett, which owns USA Today and several local newspapers, says Google has too much control over the online advertising business, leading to declining ad spending despite growing online readership. The gist of the complaint is that Google owns the largest ad exchange and ad server – both acquired and not built organically – and this arrangement has led to a decline in industry revenue.
“Content producers, including hundreds of our local news outlets, are creating tremendous value but seeing no financial benefit because Google has monopolized the market for the essential software and technology products that publishers and advertisers buy and sell ad space to, Gannett CEO Mike Reed wrote today. “Google trades in that conflict of interest to their advantage and to the detriment of publishers, readers and everyone else. Our lawsuit deals with more than a dozen significantly anti-competitive and deceptive actions by Google, which started as early as 2009 and continue to the present day.”
In a statement to ReturnByte, Google insisted that its services are popular because they’re the best — not because of a lack of competition. “These claims are simply false. Publishers can choose from a variety of options when it comes to using ad technology to monetize — in fact, Gannett uses dozens of competing ad services, including Google Ad Manager,” said Dan Taylor, director of Google Ads. “And when publishers choose to use Google tools, they get most of their income. We’ll show the court how our advertising products benefit publishers and help them monetize their content online.” Google says the average large publisher uses six different platforms to sell ads on their website, while advertisers and media agencies use more than three platforms to buy ads. The search giant describes its ad tech fees as transparent and in line with industry rates .
However, Gannett’s complaints are similar to those of the DOJ, which in January filed suit (along with eight states) to break up Google’s advertising operations. “Google’s anticompetitive conduct has raised barriers to entry artificially high, forced major competitors out of the market for ad technology tools, deterred potential competitors from entering the market, and left Google’s few remaining competitors marginalized and unfairly disadvantaged,” the Justice Department argued. at the moment. It was the DoJ’s second lawsuit against Google, following former Attorney General Bill Barr’s 2020 lawsuit accusing the company of monopolizing search and search-related advertising.
The latest lawsuits by Gannett and the DOJ allege that Google has stifled competition in the industry through acquisitions. “Whenever Google’s customers and competitors responded with an innovation that threatened Google’s stranglehold on one of these ad technology tools, Google’s anticompetitive response has been swift and effective,” the DOJ said.
Gannett is no stranger to monopolistic accusations. Although the company is over 116 years old, it was acquired by New Media Investment Group and merged with GateHouse Media (owned the Gannett brand) in 2019. Since the merger, Gannett has laid off more than half of its workforce and closed numerous local news outlets. sockets. According to Nieman Lab, Gannett “owned 261 dailies and 302 weeklies in the immediate post-acquisition period. By the end of 2022, they were 217 dailies and 175 weeklies,” though some were due to selling the papers to local buyers. Additionally, the company grew from about 25,000 employees at the time of the acquisition to 11,200. in its latest report.
