EU antitrust regulators have charged Google, a subsidiary of Alphabet, with engaging in anti-competitive practices in its digital advertising business. The European Commission has released a statement of objections, following a two-year investigation into the case.
According to the EU competition enforcer, Google has been accused of favoring its own online display advertising technology services to the detriment of competing providers, advertisers, and online publishers. The commission alleges that since 2014, Google has abused its dominant position by giving preferential treatment to its ad exchange AdX during ad selection auctions, as well as in the bidding process of its ad buying tools, Google Ads and DV360.
The EU competition watchdog believes that implementing behavioral remedies would not effectively address these anti-competitive practices. Instead, they suggest that Google should be required to divest a portion of its services to resolve the competition concerns.
With a global market share of 28% in ad revenue, Google is the leading digital advertising platform. In 2022, its advertising revenues, which include earnings from various services such as search, Gmail, Google Play, Google Maps, YouTube adverts, Google Ad Manager, AdMob, and AdSense, totaled $224.5 billion, accounting for 79% of its total revenues.
Although Google had attempted to settle the case shortly after the EU investigation began, regulators grew frustrated with the slow progress and the lack of significant concessions.
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