Today, hearings begin in technology company Google’s lawsuit against the €4.34 billion fine.
imposed by the European Union to abuse its market dominance in the Android operating system.
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The General Court of the European Union, located within the structure of the European Court of Justice, will also discuss the case brought by US-based Google, against the EU Commission’s decision this week.
In 2016, the European Union accused Google of dominating the market through the Android operating system and violating competition rules.
The accusation also stems from Google’s submission of its own search and several other applications installed on Android devices.
The EU investigation revealed that Google’s contracts with several device manufacturers forced Google Search, Play Store, and Chrome browser to preload.
Some phone manufacturers paid if they pre-loaded Google search.
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In 2018, the European Union imposed a fine of 4.34 billion euros on Google.
The case in the General Court of the European Union is expected to take one year, and after the decision, the file can be taken to the European Court of Justice for legality review.
Previously, Google was fined €2.4 billion by the European Union Commission in 2017 for taking advantage of its “shopping” services through its search engine and abusing its dominance.
The European Union also fined Google €1.49 billion in 2019 for abusing the market dominance of the AdSense “ad service”.
Consequently, the European Union fined Google more than 8 billion euros in total for the files between 2017 and 2019.
The EU Commission has the power to inspect companies operating in EU countries to see if there is an anti-competitive situation in their sectors.
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If the EU Commission finds a violation of competition or antitrust laws in the said review, it ends it and imposes heavy fines on the companies.
Companies can appeal fines in EU courts.
