December 18, 2014 An antitrust lawsuit was filed against Android as the pressure by European authorities increased on the Internet search companies. Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) will try to persuade a judge to dismiss this lawsuit. Two consumers of Android smartphones filed a case against Google Inc. saying that the OS requires for the manufacturers of smartphone to restrict competing applications in the market, such as those by Microsoft. Partly this is done by making Google apps the default phone apps. The hearing for the case will be in San Jose on Thursday.
The major issue was that Google is the default search engine in Android phones. Google Inc. is arguing with the court that the class action should be dismissed as the smartphones offer no restriction and users can use any apps they want. But the plaintiffs countered this argument by saying that majority of users do not even know how to change the default settings, or simply do not wish to go through the trouble of doing that. A better option would be for the phone to ask the users which settings they want on startup when they use the phones for the first time.
In the last month, European Parliament passed a resolution asking all the antitrust authorities to attack and break Google Inc. – a very overwhelming development indeed. The lawyer for plaintiffs said that Google Inc. is the one behind forcing the manufacturers of phone to set Google as its default engine, and they are unable to use Bing, Microsoft Corp.’s search engine, as default. The company is well-aware that the users will rather use the default search engine than go through the settings and change it. This gives Google’s search engine and edge over the competing search engines. This is an unfair advantage to Google Inc. seeing as how Android has a huge market share in the smartphone industry.
Google Inc. has clarified that there are no restrictions on the phone manufacturers. Phone manufacturers are not obligated to keep Google’s apps and search engine as default. Furthermore, the consumers are not forced to keep the default settings; they can change it at will. If they do not wish to it is not the fault of the manufacturer or Google.
Even if the phone manufacturers install Google apps, competing apps can still be preloaded. Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) lawyer said that the company is consistent with lawful and legal competition and it promotes only healthy competition as well. So the allegations that the company is trying to reduce competition unfairly and unlawfully are wrong. Google Inc. has another argument on their side – the lawsuit has no proof that the company asks manufacturing companies to make the consumers pay more for the phones. Since the lawsuit does not have sufficient proof to support the allegations, Google Inc. is right to argue that the case should be dismissed. Meanwhile, the plaintiffs’ lawyer said that he has discovered some juicy material about Google Inc. that will definitely pressurize the tech giant once the information becomes public knowledge.
