Original title: EU may fine Google billions of dollars, but not shake its dominant position
In the morning of April 13, Beijing time, Margrethe vestager, the EU's antitrust Commissioner, has made it clear that her task is to investigate the anti competitive behavior of US technology. Last month, Alpha's Google became her target, threatening to split it.
However, a recent decision made by the European Union shows that even for a staunch antitrust fighter like westakir, it is very difficult to contain the power of American technology giants. Westakir wanted Google to loosen its grip on Android smartphone makers, but the end result didn't work out to her liking.
According to people familiar with the matter, the European Union will make a final judgment on the case in the next few months. The European Union is likely to impose billions of dollars on Google and end a clause in the Android licensing agreement. In this clause, Google banned mobile phone manufacturers from promoting competing products of Google search and Google maps.
But industry executives and analysts agree that the ruling will not threaten Google's dominance in the market, because mobile phone manufacturers are actually very willing to stand on the same front with Google.
Robert Marcus, a former member of Microsoft's mobile strategy team and partner of quantum wave capital, an investment firm, believes that any punishment imposed by the EU on Google is basically unlikely to have a significant impact on Google.
The decision in this case will provide reference for regulators in Europe and other regions. At present, regulators in many countries are investigating us technology companies such as Google, apple, Facebook and Amazon. The scope of the investigation includes anti competitive behavior, tax avoidance, user data and hate speech.
German regulators have proved through their own efforts that targeted measures against technology companies can force companies to change their behavior, such as forcing social media to remove hate speech from their platforms more quickly. In addition, tax authorities can also plug tax loopholes, and modify the law, in order to get more tax.
The European Commission declined to respond to the news. Google did not respond to requests for comment.