Epic Games won its antitrust lawsuit against Google in December after a federal jury determined that the latter violated US antitrust rules in how it operates the Play Store. A few months later, the gaming developer filed a list of requests that, if adopted, will completely disrupt the Play Store. Now, Google has filed an injunction, stating that it would not give Epic what it wants without a battle since the company’s requests “stray far beyond the trial record.”
As seen by Engadget, Google wrote in the filing that the remedies Epic had proposed would require the court to micromanage “a highly complex and dynamic ecosystem” that is used by billions of users and app developers worldwide, in addition to establishing a global regulatory regime to set app prices. As you may remember, Epic is requesting that Google allow third-party app shops to access its Android app store collection. It also wants to ban any Google activity that encourages third parties, including limits on pre-installed apps.
Google said that bowing down to all those demands would “effectively prevent [it] from competing,” which in turn would negatively affect Android users and developers. Epic’s proposals only benefit Epic, Google said in its filing, and will harm other developers by depriving them of control over where their app is distributed. Manufacturers will no longer be able to take advantage of the partnerships Google typically offers, while users have to deal with additional security and privacy risks.
The company also slammed Epic over the “vagueness” of its proposed injunction, which would require the repeated and ongoing intervention of the courts. Similarly, Epic’s demands would apparently require the court to micromanage Google’s business.
“Epic’s demands would harm the privacy, security, and overall experience of consumers, developers, and device manufacturers,” Wilson White, Google’s Vice President of Government Affairs & Public Policy, told Engadget in a statement. “Not only does their proposal go far beyond the scope of the recent US trial verdict — which we will be challenging — it’s also unnecessary due to the settlement we reached last year with State Attorneys General from every state and multiple territories. We will continue to vigorously defend our right to a sustainable business model that enables us to keep people safe, partner with developers to innovate and grow their businesses, and maintain a thriving Android ecosystem for everyone.”
Google said that if Epic truly wants to promote competition rather than create “an unfair, court- supervised advantage for itself,” then it would take cues from its settlement with the state officials that previously accused the company of abusing its dominance on Android app distribution. Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney was, unsurprisingly, unhappy with that settlement, tweeting at the time: “If Google is ending its payments monopoly without imposing a Google Tax on third party transactions, we’ll settle and be Google’s friend in their new era. But if the settlement merely pays off the other plaintiffs while leaving the Google Tax in place, we’ll fight on. Consumers only benefit if antitrust enforcement not only opens up markets, but also restores price competition.”
