san francisco
A U.S. judge has ordered Google to release its Android smartphone operating system to a rival app store, in another legal setback for the tech giant.
The order comes after Google lost an antitrust lawsuit brought by Epic Games, the maker of Fortnite, after a California jury found that Google had illegal monopolistic power through the Android Play Store. The court ruled that it exercised the
A San Francisco jury in December ruled against Google in just a few hours, finding that the company had undertaken a variety of illegal strategies to maintain its app store monopoly on Android phones.
The order, which Google is appealing, comes after another federal judge found in August that Google’s world-class search engine was also an illegal monopoly.
Google also faces antitrust action in a third federal case in Virginia over its online advertising monopoly.
The order would prohibit Google from engaging in several of the practices deemed anticompetitive by the jury in this landmark case for the next three years.
These prohibitions include revenue sharing with potential competitors and the requirement that developers launch their apps only on the Play Store.
This injunction represents a significant challenge to Google’s dominance in the Android app ecosystem and could reshape the mobile app landscape in the coming years.
Mobile phones running on the Android operating system account for approximately 70% of the global smartphone market.
Smartphone companies can install Android apps for free, provided the Play app store remains on the homepage and other Google services are preinstalled.
