Indian antitrust authority took Google to task

Indian antitrust authority took Google to task

Delhi, 10/20/2022

The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has fined Google 13.38 billion rupees ($162 million) for alleged anti-competitive practices related to its Android mobile ecosystem.

In its response, Google called the order a „major setback for Indian consumers and businesses“ and stressed that the directive will increase the cost of mobile devices in India and could open up „serious security risks“ for Indians who use Android security features.

Background: the antitrust regulator has found that Google has an unfair market advantage due to practices such as pre-installing its own YouTube and Google Search applications on Android devices. The authority has asked Google to change some of its practices to promote competition.

It also found that Google has a dominant position in five markets in India: licensable operating systems for smartphones, app store, web search services, non-OS mobile web browsers and online video hosting.

India is Google’s largest market in terms of users. Its Android operating system runs on 97% of the 600 million smartphones in India.