Almost five years after the Department of Justice filed a suit against Google, accusing the search giant of monopoly behavior, the winners and losers of this case are finally clear.
US District Judge Amit Mehta ruled Tuesday that Google will be barred from entering exclusive contracts with partners such as Apple to give its search engine pride of place. It will also be forced to share some search data with rivals.
Google won’t be forced to spin off Chrome, a remedy that was previously on the table.
The decision opens up a host of opportunities for Google’s AI rivals, from OpenAI and Perplexity to its long-standing search challenger, Microsoft.
Google has previously said it intends to appeal the ruling, and the case will likely drag on for years.
“We have concerns about how these requirements will impact our users and their privacy, and we’re reviewing the decision closely,” said Lee-Anne Mulholland, Google’s vice president of regulatory affairs, in a statement on Tuesday.
Here are the winners and losers based on the penalties that were handed out on Tuesday.
Winners
Tuesday’s ruling arguably hands Google the best-case scenario. For one, it will not be forced to sell off its Chrome browser, which is a huge distribution tool for funneling users to Google Search.
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Not only does Chrome capture those all-important search queries for Google, it also captures user query data that it can use to make Google Search even better. In short, it would have been a painful loss for Google.
Judge Mehta ruled, however, that Google will be barred from entering exclusive agreements to distribute its search engine, though he stopped short of blocking those payments altogether. The ruling did block Google from entering deals that force partners to install apps such as Search or Chrome for access to the Google Play store.
Google’s payments to Apple and other partners to secure its search engine in a default position have been at the heart of the DOJ case from the very start. The decision on Tuesday will allow Google to keep paying for that default placement with Apple and other partners — it just won’t be allowed to force them to use only Google.
Apple
Google paid Apple around $20 billion in 2022 to be the default search engine on the iPhone. That’s about a fifth of Apple’s annual services revenue.
The ruling that Google can continue making those payments — so long as they are not exclusive — is a win for Apple, which can continue to collect its fee from Google.
The partnership has been mutually beneficial. In 2020, Google internally projected that it would lose between 60% and 80% of its search volume on Apple devices if it were replaced as the default general search engine, per a court filing last year. That figure would represent between $28.2 billion and $32.7 billion in net revenue losses, it added.
With the agreement between Google and Apple still allowed, it could also open the door to more collaboration in AI.
“We now see a green light for a bigger Gemini AI partnership between Apple and Google with this DOJ case now in the rear view mirror,” wrote Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives in a note on Tuesday.
OpenAI and Perplexity
Now that Google can’t prohibit Apple from including other search tools on the iPhone, its AI rivals OpenAI and Perplexity could benefit substantially. OpenAI launched its own search service in 2024, and one of its biggest challenges is distribution.
Now, Apple could include and promote ChatGPT as a search engine without violating any deal with Google. The same applies to Perplexity, which Apple has reportedly discussed buying outright, Bloomberg reported. Perplexity declined to comment for this story.
The AI startups also stand to gain from Google’s requirement to share some of its search index and user-interaction data to curb exclusionary behavior. That data should be valuable for improving their rival search offerings.
Losers
Google’s browser rivals
The US government won’t force Google to spin off Chrome, a key distribution point for Google with over 3 billion monthly active users. That means Chrome will continue to enjoy Google’s financial and technological backing, making it just as hard to displace as before.
That’s bad news for Google’s browser competitors, namely Microsoft’s Edge, which comes bundled with every Windows computer and still has far fewer users. The same goes for Apple’s Safari and Perplexity’s new Comet browser.
Perplexity made a bid this summer to buy Chrome for billions of dollars more than the AI startup’s entire valuation. While that was almost certainly never going to happen, it showcased how vulnerable Google was before this decision made it clear that Chrome isn’t under threat anytime soon.
Business Insider has reached out to Microsoft, Apple, and OpenAI for comment.
