US DOJ Drops Bid To Make Google Sell AI Investment in Antitrust Case
Google has a little respite in the antitrust case. The U. S. Department of Justice (DOJ) dropped the clause to force Google to sell its AI Investments , including the Anthropic company, to boost competition. Anthropic had contended to the court that losing the investment would hand competitive advantage to its rivals OpenAI and Microsoft. The prosecutors obtained evidence that shows a risk if Google’s AI investments are banned. The risk is that it could have unintended consequences in the evolving landscape of AI. Google holds minority stakes worth billions of dollars in Anthropic.
The prosecutors asked that in future, Google should inform the government about its plan for investment in generative AI beforehand to get the approval. Google said it is going to appeal against this investment restriction order. The Lawsuit was filed back on 20 October 2020 with a primary focus on Google’s monopoly in the search engine market. It was said in the lawsuit that google is unlawfully maintained monopolies in search and online advertising markets through its anticompetitive practices.
However, a separate lawsuit was filed on January 24, 2023, by the DOJ, which focused more on digital advertising and was much harsher than the first lawsuit. It described how Google gained an unfair advantage by buying out the ad tools and serving technology. It asked for Google to sell significant portions of its ad tech business and stop certain business practices. However, that trial for second lawsuit was completed in November 2024, and a ruling is expected by August 2025
US DOJ also wants Google to sell off its Chrome browser as a part of its final remedy proposal in the antitrust case. It also requires google to stop paying partners for special treatment of its search engine. It is an unfair advantage if you are the default search engine. As per Reliablesoft, Google has an 89.74% share in the market, and Bing is languishing in 2nd place with just 3.97%. The tech world is eagerly looking forward to the conclusion of this case, which has the potential to change the tech world a great deal. It remains to be seen what the final verdict will be. Google has its task cut out, and there is a fair chance that it will get some unfavorable orders in the final ruling.
