Google (GOOGL) suffered one of its biggest setbacks on Wednesday when a top European court fined it 4.125 billion euros ($4.13 billion) for using its Android mobile operating system to thwart rivals, offering a precedent for other regulators to ratchet up pressure.
The unit of US tech giant Alphabet had challenged an earlier ruling, but the decision was broadly upheld by the Europe’s second-highest court in Wednesday’s ruling and the fine was reduced only modestly from 4.34 billion euros ($4.34 billion).
It is a record fine for an antitrust violation. The European Commission has imposed a total of 8.25 billion euros in antitrust fines on the world’s most popular internet search engine in three investigations stretching back more than a decade.
This is the second court defeat for Google which lost its challenge to a 2.42 billion euro ($2.42 billion) fine last year, the first of a trio of cases.
Credit: cnn.com
