Google & South Korea: Settlement of the Google Play-App Store App Store Anti-Trust Claims by the U.S. Supreme Court
Lawmakers have been questioning the safety of the app store around the world. In both South Korea and the European Union, laws have been passed mandating that Google open up its app store by doing things like allowing consumers to download and pay for apps directly from developers.
The tech giant said it will also simplify the process of making apps available for download outside of its own app marketplace, known as the Google Play store.
According to court filings, the states will ask Judge James Donato to approve the settlement on February 8th. Both of those involved in the case will be having a conversation in the second week of January about what might have happened in the case.
The tech giant will give over $630 million into a settlement fund, as well as giving over $70 million to the states that brought legal action against it.
On iPhones, Apple operates an app store under terms similar to Google, and it, too, has been the target of scrutiny in lawsuits and by policymakers. Apple’s app store policies were also sued by Epic Games. In September 2021, a federal judge largely sided with Apple, but Epic Games is appealing the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court.
A federal judge will hold hearings in January about what changes Google must make in order to remedy the anti-trust issues raised in court at the trial.
Several legal battles are still pending concerning whether the company abuses its immense power, as more antitrust challenges than ever have been encountered by the company. Among them, a case brought by the Justice Department centered on Google allegedly breaking the law in maintaining its dominance of online search and advertising.
The User Choice Billing participants will get a discount of 4 percent off the price when they choose to use their own payment system, and that won’t change, as a result of the settlement, we confirmed with Dan Jackson. When developers choose the 4 percent rate, they will lose money, while Google gives companies a free ride and seems to charge everyone else.
Perhaps most importantly, Google is reserving the right not to let developers like Netflix link to their own websites to give their users a discounted rate. The settlement agreement says that there’s no requirement for the company to allow developers to include links that let users make purchases outside of the app they are in. We are still waiting to hear if Apple will allow links and/or buttons to alternative payment systems. But the Google / state AGs settlement suggests that regardless, Google will not be required to allow links.
More importantly, several of the most significant sounding changes here are tied to Google’s User Choice Billing program — which is mostly a fake choice, the Epic v. Google trial proved.
During its trial, the company argued that users are perfectly able to install third-party applications on their devices through any method they choose, and that many of its agreements with developers, carriers, and OEMs did not require them to exclusively put Google Play on their devices.
Is that what it sounds like? It makes for a slightly different landscape in the app store than we’ve experienced over the past decade. Many of the concessions are not really real concessions as they have an expiration date.
The biggest change: Google will need to let developers steer consumers away from the Google Play Store for several years, if this settlement is approved.