EU punishes Google with record $5.1B antitrust fine for deals requiring preinstalled apps, services
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The European Union has fined Google $5.1 billion for using its market dominance to encourage device makers to preinstall its apps and services on Android phones and tablets.
The antitrust fine by the EU is a record, report the Washington Post, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. It follows another EU fine of $2.7 billion against Google last year for using its search results to promote its comparison shopping service at the top of the search screen.
The new fine stems from Google’s market power arising from its free Android operating system, which runs more than 80 percent of the world’s smartphones.
European regulators accused Google of telling handset makers using the system that they risk losing access to Google’s app store unless they make Google’s search engine the default and preinstall its Chrome browser.
The company plans to appeal the decision.
