A Berlin court ruled against Google in a big antitrust case and told the tech giant to pay €572 million (about $665 million) in damages. The choice was made because Google leveraged its strong market position in price comparisons. This choice is very important in a legal battle that has been going on for years. It shows that regulators and competitors in Europe are still making Google change the way it does business.
Google’s antitrust violations: A history of self-preferencing
The court said that Google unfairly gave its own shopping comparison service higher search results. This behavior, called self-preferencing, hurt other price comparison sites. This German case comes right after a big 2017 ruling by the European Commission that said Google had broken EU competition rules and fined the company. The recent lawsuit was about damages that occurred between 2008 and 2023.
The court gave two companies damages:
- €465 million (about $540 million) to the price comparison platform Idealo
- €107 million (about $124 million) to another comparison tool, Producto
Both sides in the argument have said that the fight isn’t over. Google has said it will fight the decision. A company spokesperson said, “The changes we made in 2017 are working well,” and noted that the number of price comparison sites using its service has grown significantly.
Idealo also wants to continue its legal fight. The amount given is much less than the €3.3 billion it wanted. The company’s CEO said, “We will keep fighting because there must be consequences for market abuse.” This German decision is part of a larger wave of antitrust lawsuits that Google is facing. The Department of Justice won a separate, important antitrust case against Google in the United States not too long ago.
The case was about Google’s digital advertising technology. The Brookings Institution says that the company is facing several antitrust cases that challenge the basic structure of its business. These global antitrust cases show that people are paying more attention to Big Tech’s power. Regulators and businesses worldwide will be watching closely to see what happens in this German antitrust case.
