United States v. Google LLC

Google LLC (defendant) developed a search engine that became extremely lucrative, generating billions of dollars from advertisers seeking to place digital ads alongside search results. Google’s search engine dominated over other options. By 2020, nearly 90 percent of all searches in the United States, and 95 percent of searches on mobile devices, went through Google. In contrast, the next largest search engine, Microsoft’s Bing, processed only 6 percent of searches. Google’s market dominance was attributable in part to Google’s significant, ongoing investment in innovation and its shrewd business decisions, particularly regarding the early development of a search platform for mobile devices. However, Google had another market advantage, namely, exclusive-distribution contracts with browser developers, mobile-device manufacturers, and wireless carriers (collectively, developers). Under the agreements, developers agreed to preload Google as the only default search engine on their products. In exchange, Google paid the developers revenue shares, meaning a percentage of the ad revenue generated from queries run through the preloaded search engines. The payments to developers totaled over $26 billion in 2021. The United States (plaintiff) filed an antitrust suit against Google, alleging that Google was violating Sherman Act § 2 by engaging in improper conduct to maintain monopoly power.