Anti-trust watchdog fines Google $162m over market dominance
Google has been fined more than $160 million by India’s anti-trust watchdog after a probe found the tech company abused its top position in the local smartphone market.
Google's Android mobile operating system is by far the biggest in India and is
run on 95 percent of all the country’s smartphones, according to research
agency Counterpoint but the Competition Commission of India (CCI) said the
google operating system was configured to unlawfully remove rivals of YouTube,
web browser Chrome and other popular Google apps.
According to a CCI statement on Thursday night, October 20, Android had a suite
of Google apps pre-installed on its phones, including the company’s own search
engine, “which accorded significant competitive edge to Google’s search
services over its competitors”.
“Markets should be allowed to compete on merits and the onus is on (Google)
that its conduct does not impinge this competition on merits,” it added.
The commission has levied a fine of 13.4 billion rupees ($162 million) and
instructed the company to allow Android users to remove pre-installed Google
apps.
It also told Google not to enter into any agreement with smartphone makers that
would encourage them to only sell Android-based devices or exclusively use its
software in the market
Google faced a similar anti-trust ruling in the European Union that found the
company had imposed “unlawful restrictions” on smartphone makers to benefit its
search engine and was also fined $4.1 billion by the EU.
India is home to the second-highest number of smartphone users in the world, after China with annual sales exceeding 169 million units.
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