Clearly, Google abused. This is certainly the opinion of the European Competition Commissioner, Margrethe Vestager, who announced on Wednesday from Brussels a new and potentially punitive proceedings against the omnipotence of the Internet. The latter is suspected, surprise surprise, of abuse of dominant position characterized in most of its businesses. pastor’s daughter and more liberal persuasion, the Danish do not mess with “free and undistorted competition” dear to the technocrats of the Commission: it will therefore soon send to Google – renamed ago Alphabet year, but nobody did it – two “statements of objections” to anticompetitive practices. The first concerns how the Web giant lays down the law in the online advertising with its famous sponsored links Google Adwords, the second is its price comparison service Google Shopping, already in the sights of the Commission with a first investigation in April, 2015.
in the first case, Google, which converge today to 70% to 80% of internet queries in most EU markets (and even over 90% in France ), is accused by the European Commission for “ abused its dominant position by artificially limiting the ability of third-party websites, display contextual ads from competitors.” Clearly, having ousted the advertisements offered by competing authorities, relegating them from the first search results page, the only one that matters to users. With this system of sponsored links and purchase of keywords by advertisers that the California firm has built all its model from its search engine: a great cash machine that generated $ 15 billion of profits (more than 13 million euros), more than 70% of the profits of Google in 2015, and most of its $ 75 billion in revenue. This is the heart of the empire that is subject Margrethe Vestager.
A slogan in the closet
In the second case, the European competition watchdog has “strengthened “its objections to Google Shopping, after a first preliminary conclusion that had already resulted in an abuse of dominance suspicion. Again, the Mountain View giant is accused of quietly promoted its own price comparison service, at the expense of other comparators in the results that appear on its search page. Not at all fair and above all totally contrary to the competition rules in force in the European Union. “ If our investigations conclude that the infringement by Google, EU rules on anti-competitive practices, the Commission has the duty to act to protect European consumers and the exercise of fair competition on the European market “, clearly threatened Vestager commissioner, at a press conference in Brussels.
as Microsoft his time, Google, which has long relegated to the closet the pioneer nice slogan do not be evil has clearly become a thorn in Brussels. Because after another investigation on April 20 for the Android operating system and mobile applications from Google, always for abuse of dominant position, the California firm is now covered by three parallel proceedings from the Commission. For five years the competition services investigate Google’s practices in its core businesses. The first investigation was launched in 2010 by former European competition commissioner and vice president of the European Commission, Joaquin Almunia. Margrethe Vestager and seems determined to carry to completion the work of his predecessor.
A fine that would beat all records
That risk Google? On paper, the world company the Internet is liable to a fine of mega-3 and 6 billion euros that would beat all records in the annals of Brussels. These fines are in fact calculated as a percentage of turnover, huge in the case of Google. For comparison, in 2013, Microsoft, accused the same complaints of abuse of dominant position with its Internet Explorer browser, was fined 561 million euros for violation of its commitments amicably with the Commission … But initially, Google and its parent Alphabet have ten weeks, until Wednesday, September 7, to meet Brussels accusations. Suffice to say that the battalions of lawyers will attempt to dismantle point by point what lobbyists legions failed to defuse upstream. “We believe that our innovations and product enhancements offered more choice to European consumers and boost competition. We will examine the new parts of the Commission and bring a detailed answer in the coming weeks “, said the leadership of Google in an email to AFP.
Whatever happens, it will take many months of adversarial proceedings to lead to a possible sanction against Google. But the Californian company has not finished with trouble on the Old Continent. The other front is obviously tax. Google, which is in the “optimization” as other US companies by transferring the bulk of its profits hex to its Irish subsidiary, is already the subject of a recovery in France, Bercy, who has searched the headquarters Parisian Google France, is claiming € 1.6 billion in back taxes. And taught by Le Figaro that the company had paid only EUR 6.7 million under the corporate income tax in 2015 on a turnover estimated at over 1.5 billion euros in France … Suffice to say that the account is not there. And other countries like Italy and Britain also claimed back taxes to the deadbeat. It would certainly more than in Brussels, that Margrethe Vestager is also involved.
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