A US court has set a trial for September to address antitrust concerns over Google’s dominance in online advertising.

The case follows a ruling that Google unlawfully tied its ad exchange to its publisher ad server, reducing competition.

US District Judge Leonie Brinkema scheduled the trial after discussions between Google and the Department of Justice (DOJ).

The DOJ plans to propose that Google divest parts of its ad tech business, including its ad exchange and publisher ad server. Google opposes this and favors behavioral remedies, such as making real-time bidding data accessible to competitors.

The DOJ argues that Google’s practices harm publishers and users by reducing competition.

🔗 Source: Reuters

🧠 Food for thought

1️⃣ The shift from fines to structural remedies marks an inflection point in tech antitrust

The DOJ’s push to make Google sell off parts of its ad tech business represents a significant escalation from previous antitrust approaches that primarily relied on fines.

Since 2010, Google has faced numerous antitrust actions, with the EU imposing over €8 billion in penalties across multiple cases, including a €4.34 billion fine for Android-related practices and €1.49 billion for AdSense restrictions1.

Despite these massive financial penalties, regulators are increasingly concluding that fines alone don’t effectively restore competition, as evidenced by Judge Brinkema’s finding that Google’s practices had harmed competition, publishers, and ultimately internet users2.

This case mirrors the historical Microsoft antitrust action, where structural remedies were contemplated, suggesting a potential return to more interventionist approaches after decades of relatively restrained antitrust enforcement2.

The shift toward potential divestitures reflects growing regulatory consensus that the economics of digital platforms may require more dramatic interventions than traditional antitrust remedies to effectively restore competitive conditions.

2️⃣ Advertising technology represents the hidden infrastructure of the internet economy

Publisher ad servers and ad exchanges, while largely invisible to everyday users, form the crucial economic backbone that enables the existence of free content across the web.

These technologies connect website publishers with advertisers through automated systems that Google has dominated for over 15 years through both acquisitions and specific technical practices identified as anti-competitive3.

Recent Google developments