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Update: Right now, the European Union has an anti-trust case out against Google over Android and the amount of Google-owned apps and services that come pre-installed with the OS. Google was initially supposed to present its defence back in July but had the deadline extended to September. However, it looks like Google is still not ready and has secured another extension from the EU.
Google will now be filing its defence response by the 7th of October, as long as no further extensions are required. This was confrmed today by a spokesperson for the European Commission (via Reuters), who said: “We confirm that the new deadline set by the Commission is Oct. 7. Google asked for additional time to review the documents in the case file.”
Aside from that, Google has two other anti-trust cases to fend off. One over Google's shopping search engine, as well as another over Google's advertising practises. According to the EU rules, Google could be fined up to $7.4 billion or 10 percent of its yearly earnings for each of these charges if found guilty of breaching anti-trust laws. However, a fine that large is unlikely.
Original Story: Back in April, the European Commission officially filed its anti-trust complaint against Google in regards to Android and its pre-installed apps and services. At the time, Google was given until the 27th of July to refute the complaint but ended up nabbing an extention, bringing the deadline to the 7th of September. However, it looks like Google still doesn't quite have its case prepared, leading to a new deadline being set.
Google can be fined up to $7.4 billion if the EU Commission rules that antitrust laws were broken. This is just one of several antitrust cases out against Google in the EU as the company has also fielded complaints about search result rankings.
As Reuters reports, the European Commission has set a new deadline for the 20th of September, at which time Google will need to prove why Android isn't violating any European antitrust rules.
The case is similar to the one Microsoft faced several years back for shipping copies of Windows with just Internet Explorer pre-installed. In this instance, the EU is taking issue with Google's range of pre-installed apps and services on Android.
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KitGuru Says: I don't necessarily think that pre-installed apps discourage users from looking elsewhere for something they like better. However, Google may have a hard time convincing the EU of that. Do you guys think pre-installed Android apps hurt competing services?
My god what a joke this is just as stupid as when they were going after Microsoft. Here is the thing Google owns the OS and as such can supply what ever apps it deems fit. If another company wants to make a app that does the same thing as a google app and compete then power to that company they are treated the same as any other company if the app follows the guide lines of the rules set in place to protect the consumer from bad apps unlike Apple which will pretty much block apps that compete with it’s own apps. Why does the EU not go after Apple which is known to be far far worse than any other company out there for anti competitive practices. I am sure this is a cash grab yet again to extort money from a rich company it has nothing to do with what the charges set in place by the EU. I really don’t care if you agree or not it’s the truth I can not help if it hurts.
Again if a company wants to compete with a company like Google there is nothing stopping or blocking them from doing so we don’t need the EU to intervene yet again.
Apple will likely be lining the pockets of these people