A federal judge on Monday ordered Google to tear down the digital walls shielding its Android app store from competition as punishment for maintaining an illegal monopoly that helped expand the company’s internet empire.
Donato is giving Google until November to make the revisions dictated in his order. The company had insisted it would take 12 to 16 months to design the safeguards needed to reduce the chances of potentially malicious software making its way into rival Android app stores and infecting millions of Samsung phones and other mobile devices running on its free Android software.
The court-mandated overhaul is meant to prevent Google from walling off competition in the Android app market as part of an effort to protect a commission system that has been a boon for one of the world’s most prosperous companies and helped elevate the market value of its corporate parent Alphabet Inc. to USD 2 trillion.
Google said in a blog post that it will ask the court to pause the pending changes, and will appeal the court’s decision.
Donato also ruled that, for a period of three years ending November 1, 2027, Google won’t be able to share revenue from its Play Store with anyone who distributes Android apps or is considering launching an Android app distribution platform or store. It also won’t be allowed to pay developers, or share revenue, so that they will launch an app in the Google Play Store first or exclusively, and can’t make deals with manufacturers to preinstall the Google Play store on any specific location on an Android device. It also won’t be able to require apps to use its billing system or tell customers that they can download apps elsewhere and potentially for cheaper.
