Google Resolves Antitrust Concerns Amicably with the German Federal Cartel Office

Goog­le has ami­ca­bly resol­ved com­pe­ti­ti­on con­cerns with the Ger­man Fede­ral Car­tel Office (Bun­des­kar­tell­amt – BKar­tA). This emer­ges from a press release issued by the BKar­tA. Accor­ding to the state­ment, the com­pa­ny has sub­mit­ted com­mit­ments, which the BKar­tA has declared bin­ding. As a result, the pro­cee­dings under Sec­tion 19a(2) of the Ger­man Act against Res­traints of Com­pe­ti­ti­on (GWB) could be discontinued.

This illus­tra­tes the poten­ti­al for anti­trust cases to be sett­led ami­ca­bly. Not a dra­ma­tic show­down, but rather busi­ness as usu­al for a major corporation.

What was the case about?

The sett­le­ment rela­tes to pro­cee­dings that the BKar­tA has been pur­suing for some time against the plat­form con­glo­me­ra­te Alpha­bet. Accor­ding to the authority’s press release, the case falls under the “new pro­vi­si­ons for digi­tal cor­po­ra­ti­ons” under Sec­tion 19a GWB. Spe­ci­fi­cal­ly, it con­cerns a second-stage pro­cee­ding under Sec­tion 19a(2) GWB, which grants the BKar­tA con­cre­te inter­ven­ti­on powers. The first-stage decis­i­on under Sec­tion 19a(1) GWB — estab­li­shing Alphabet’s para­mount cross-mar­ket signi­fi­can­ce for com­pe­ti­ti­on — was alre­a­dy issued in 2021.

The BKar­tA iden­ti­fied two key are­as of con­cern, which were addres­sed through the commitments:

1. Goog­le Auto­mo­ti­ve Ser­vices: Car manu­fac­tu­r­ers were pre­vious­ly only able to licen­se Goog­le Maps, Goog­le Play, and the Goog­le Assistant joint­ly for their in-vehic­le info­tain­ment sys­tems. Going for­ward, it will be pos­si­ble to licen­se the­se ser­vices indi­vi­du­al­ly. In addi­ti­on, Goog­le has agreed to aban­don cer­tain con­trac­tu­al arran­ge­ments dee­med cri­ti­cal. Fur­ther­mo­re, Goog­le com­mits to crea­ting the neces­sa­ry con­di­ti­ons for ser­vice interoperability.
2. Goog­le Maps Plat­form: Here, exis­ting con­trac­tu­al rest­ric­tions are to be lifted to allow the inte­gra­ti­on of Google’s map­ping ser­vices with third-par­ty offe­rings. The con­tents of the map­ping ser­vices are to be ope­ned to ensu­re ser­vice compatibility.

What is the signi­fi­can­ce of an anti­trust commitment?

Anti­trust com­mit­ments repre­sent an effec­ti­ve means of resol­ving con­cerns rai­sed by com­pe­ti­ti­on aut­ho­ri­ties in a self-deter­mi­ned and coope­ra­ti­ve man­ner. At the same time, such com­mit­ments estab­lish legal cer­tain­ty for the com­pa­ny invol­ved and poten­ti­al­ly for others affected.

Under Sec­tion 32b(1) GWB, a com­pa­ny may offer com­mit­ments during pro­cee­dings to dis­pel the authority’s con­cerns. The com­pe­ti­ti­on aut­ho­ri­ty then asses­ses whe­ther the­se com­mit­ments are sui­ta­ble to address the con­cerns rai­sed. If dee­med appro­pria­te, the aut­ho­ri­ty can decla­re them bin­ding by issuing a for­mal decis­i­on. The BKar­tA reta­ins the right to reopen the case if jus­ti­fied by sub­se­quent developments.