The Chief Executive Officer of the company behind the popular mobile game Fortnite scored a big win this week against Google in an antitrust case that accused the company of using its monopoly to distribute software for Android devices to charge hefty fees to developers.
Tim Sweeney, the head of the gaming company, attributed his company’s ability to beat the tech giant in court to one thing – paper trail.
“Google executives wrote things down”, Sweeney commented during an interview with CNN this Tuesday when he stressed the importance of discovering communications within the company referring to its practices as a major tilting factor during the legal proceeding.
Jury Rules that Google Engaged in Monopolistic Practices
Four days ago, a jury declared that Google possessed a monopolistic position in the mobile app market for Android devices as its Google Play Store is the only channel through which apps could be safely and legitimately distributed to users.
In addition to this, court documents showed that Google also used unlawful tactics to force developers to process all in-app purchases through its payment processing solutions. This gives them no other choice rather than paying the company a hefty commission to earn revenue.
Also read: Google Decides to Allow Games With NFT Trading in the Play Store
Sweeney commented that, during the trial, it became evident that Google’s executives contradicted themselves when giving testimony. What the officers told the court was strikingly different from what the the company’s internal communications asserted.
“It became very striking early on, and throughout the entire trial, that Google executives put their thoughts in writing very clearly”, the CEO commented.
He added: “…then they got up on the stand and gave testimony that was just utterly contradictory to what they’d written down”.
Internal Communications at Apple Did Not Help Epic Games’ Case
Sweeney compared this practice, which seemed odd for such a large public tech company, to the contrasting habit of one of its other rivals in this antitrust crusade – Apple (AAPL) – as the company headed by Tim Cook put nearly nothing in writing internally aside from whatever policy they ultimately drafted to deal with the issues at hand.
“The big difference between Apple and Google is Apple didn’t write anything down. And because they’re a big vertically integrated monopoly, they don’t do deals with developers and carriers to shut down competition, they just simply block at the technical level”, Sweeney told CNN.
For Epic Games, it was impossible to prove that the iPhone maker enforced these unfair practices due to the absence of hard evidence that backed their claims. In the case of Google, the opposite occured as evidence was widely available, starting with executives who communicated and rewarded each other for what they accomplished in terms of financial performance in exchange for squeezing developers on fees and commissions.
Some practices within Google also alarmed the jury and have been the cause of further scrutiny against the tech firm. For example, the company’s internal logs are automatically deleted every 24 hours and high level staff were told to use auto-deleting messaging.
This revealed a level of obscurity that regulators are not comfortable with, especially at a point when tech companies are being closely examined across the world due to their significant reach and relatively concentrated and dominant positions in key segments of the industry like mobile app distribution, online advertising, and data sharing.
It is Unclear if Fortnite Will Be Allowed to Go Back to Google Play Store
The judge in charge of the Epic Games v Alphabet (GOOG) case will be reviewing possible remedies that Google can adopt moving forward to deal with the issues that the ruling highlighted, including its practice that obligates developers to process payments exclusively via Google Pay.
“If it becomes impossible for Google to actually solve the problems and be trusted to solve the problems, and comply with court orders, then I think the question of structural remedies has to be raised”, Sweeney stressed.
However, he has no idea if the court ruling or the judge’s sentence will ultimately lead to the reinstatement of Fortnite on the Google Play Store.
For now, Epic Games will await the result of the proceeding. They remain more than open to offering the game through any platform that offers fair conditions to developers.
In 2021, Google decided to reduce the commission it charges developers from 30% to 15%. However, there was a catch. This only applied to the first $1 million that developers earned via in-app purchases.
For a company like Epic Games, whose revenues exceed $5 billion per year, this means nearly no money saved in the commissions they paid. Google’s decision to trim its commission for that first million came a year after its rival in the mobile OS market, Apple, took a similar step.
Google’s Vice President for Government Affairs and Public Policy, Wilson White, issued the following statement regarding the court’s decision:
“We will continue to defend the Android business model and remain deeply committed to our users, partners, and the broader Android ecosystem”.
The company will have to wait until January when the judge issues a sentence on the verdict to analyze the path forward. However, what appears to be clear is that tensions seem to keep rising against seemingly monopolistic practices in the tech world and this could, and probably will, lead to changes in the landscape soon.