India fines Google $161 million for anti-competitive practices

Oct. 21 (UPI) -- India's Competition Commission has fined Google $161 million "for abusing its dominant position in multiple markets in the Android Mobile device ecosystem."

The commission issued a cease and desist order to Google to stop abusing its market dominance with anti-competitive practices and directed the company to "modify its conduct within a defined timeline."

"Google's business was found to be driven by the ultimate intent of increasing users on its platforms so that they interact with its revenue earning service, i.e., online search which directly affects sale of online advertising services by Google," the commission statement said.

The Indian regulatory commission said Google required users to enter into "multiple agreements to govern their rights and obligations."

The combined results of these agreements, the commission said, guaranteed a continuous access to search queries of mobile users which helped not only in protecting the advertisement revenue but also to reap the network effects through continuous improvement of services, to the exclusion of competitors.

"With these agreements in place, the competitors never stood a chance to compete effectively with Google and ultimately these agreements resulted in foreclosing the market for them as well as eliminating choice for users," the commission statement said.

India wants Google to end mandatory pre-installation of the entire Google Mobile Suite because the regulatory commission said it amounts to "imposition of unfair condition on the device manufacturers."

Google was fined $2.8 billion by the European Union for similar anti-competitive reasons back in 2017 and that fine was upheld by the EU General Court in Nov. of 2021.