Paris - Google was accused of wielding its power over most of the world’s smartphones to crush competition for applications as European Union antitrust regulators took another swipe at the US Internet giant.
The European Commission sent Google a formal antitrust complaint, accusing the company of striking restrictive contracts that prevent makers of tablets and phones from adding competing apps and web browsers. The company also pays phone makers and telecom operators to only install its search app on phones, according to an e-mailed statement Wednesday.
"We believe that Google’s behaviour denies consumers a wider choice of mobileapps and services and stands in the way of innovation by other players," EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager said.
By sending a statement of objections, the EU is opening a new front in its antitrust battle with the Alphabet unit - paving the way for potentially huge fines and radical changes to the way the company does business. It comes a year after the EU issued a formal complaint over Google’s comparison-shopping service.
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Free, open
Google countered the EU charges, saying that Android is a “free and open-source operating system.”
“Our partner agreements are entirely voluntary,” Kent Walker, the Mountain View, California-based company’s general counsel, said in a statement. “We look forward to working with the European Commission to demonstrate the careful way we’ve designed the Android model in a way that’s good for competition and for consumers.”
Android is loaded on most of the world’s smartphones and tablets - usually along with Google’s e-mail, maps and video software. That cuts off any chance for rival apps to reach customers, depriving them of the advertising revenue that powers the Internet, the EU said.
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The Android software for smartphones has been in the EU’s sights since 2013 after an industry group backed at the time by Microsoft and Nokia filed a complaint with regulators. The EU opened a formal probe last year, examining Google’s agreements with smartphone and tablet manufacturers that make devices sold with Google apps already installed.
That complaint focused on Google’s mobile application development agreements, such as those with handset makers Samsung Electronics and HTC, which require developers to use Google’s proprietary Play Services software. Manufacturers must also strike anti-fragmentation agreements to use the Play Store apps, which prevents them making their own versions of Android.
European lawmakers, who in 2014 passed a resolution urging regulators to consider breaking up Google, said the statement of objections was a step toward creating on open digital marketplace in the region.
“The requirement for phone makers and operators to preload a set of Google Apps, rather than letting them choose freely which app to upload, is certainly problematic from the consumers’ point of view,” Tremosa I. Balcells and Andreas Schwab, two members of the European Parliament, said in a statement. “The non-discrimination principle and transparency are both a must in the choice of apps and operating system as well as in web search results. This is the only way forward for Google.”
Google said last year that its partner agreements with phone manufacturers are voluntary and allow Android to be used without Google apps. Agreements to prevent fragmentation ensure that apps work well on all Android devices while app distribution deals give users "a great ’out-of-the-box’ experience with useful apps right there on the home screen," the company said.
The EU probe showed it’s "commercially important" for device makers using Android to put Google’s Play Store - where customers download apps - on phones. Loading handsets with Google Search and the Chrome browser is a pre-condition for licenses to use the Play Store, the EU says, meaning that rival search engines or web software cannot become a default on most phones sold in Europe.
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