From November on, Google will charge Android device makers a licensing fee for their Google apps for the first time in the company’s history. In July of 2018, the company was fined for more than 5 billion US dollars by the European Commission for antitrust violations.
According to “The Verge”, The Play Store and many of Google’s other apps, like Gmail, Google Maps, and YouTube, will be bundled together under a paid licensing agreement.
Before the fine, Google products were bundled with the OS system of Android. Applications as the Play Store, Google Search and Google Chrome were automatically pre installed on all Android devices sold in Europe. This action supported the capital for growth and free access of Android OS, nevertheless now, the system will have diverse obstacles for further development.
The European Commission argumented that the decision is meant to allow other browsers and search engines to “compete on the merits with Google for pre-installation on Android devices.”
The downside of this decision is that if Android phone developers decide to produce phones without the application of Google systems, Google will lose an enormous income source.
Nevertheless, the chances are high that the Play Store is likely to keep phone and tablet makers attached to Google, since it is the place where users can access all of Android applications. Moreover, as there is no way to get the Play Store and Google’s apps in Europe without paying the license fee anymore, it’s likely that cost will be passed on to consumers in the form of higher device prices.
https://www.theverge.com/2018/10/16/17984074/google-eu-android-licensing-bundle-chrome-search
Hi Alena, thanks for sharing! For some reason this is the first time I have heard about this. I would have imagined a ruling like this by the European Commission would be big news, news that you can’t miss! This reminds me of Lecture 4 and how to defend against platforms: (1) match bundle, (2) find a big brother, (3) cede & redeploy, and (4) sue. But now we can see that there is also (5) watch the government do its tricks. I guess Google can be quite lucky that this ruling only applies to Europe, just imagine what would happen in the smartphone market in Asia, where the market share of Android operating systems is at 84.12%(!!!) as compared to the market share in Europe with “only” 73.54% (statcounter, 2018)! I’m very interested in how this topic will be dealt with, but I can only imagine that Google will find a way to not loose that much money from this ruling.
source: http://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/worldwide (2018)