EU General Court upholds charges against Google, but lowers fine to €4.1 bn
15 Sep 2022
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The General Court of the European Union upheld the EU Competition Commission’s 2018 ruling that Google was abusing its dominant position as an Android provider and ordered it to pay a fine of €4.1 billion.
The court, however, paired the original fine of €4.3 billion imposed by the Commission on the California-based company to €4.1 billion.
The EU Competition Commission had fined Google for bundling Android OS with Google services, ie, for making phone makers pre-install the Chrome browser and Search app as a part of a revenue-sharing scheme.
The court while agreeing with most of the original charges, disagreed that sharing revenue is part of the original abuse, thereby also lowering the fine by €0.2 billion.
This is the second-highest court in the European Union, which means that Google can appeal again to the highest court of the bloc - the Court of Justice in Luxembourg. A statement from the company read that Android “has created more choices for everyone, not less, and supports thousands of successful businesses in Europe and around the world”.
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