The ongoing antitrust case between the United States Department of Justice and Google continues to progress. Yesterday, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella joined in by providing his statement to the court on the matter.
Nadella addressed the deal in which Google paid Apple billions of dollars annually to be the default search engine on their devices. This has made it nearly impossible for users to escape Google’s reach, aside from manually changing their default search settings. He also pointed out that while changing settings is easy on Windows, it is considerably more difficult on smartphones.
The repercussions of this situation have placed Microsoft in a challenging position. Google currently holds a 90% market share in search and continuously improves its search results due to its vast user base. Nadella sees the agreement between Google and Apple as a semi-exclusive arrangement that is easy to understand.
During one part of the proceedings, the judge asked Nadella if there was any chance of seeing a startup disrupt Google’s search dominance using AI innovations. Nadella replied that the search market is currently almost impenetrable for new players and believes there are several limitations that prevent AI from altering the current state of the market since Google already holds significant control.
However, earlier this year, Nadella expressed that Bing, powered by OpenAI, could contend for a market share in search. He has waited for this opportunity for 20 years and considers this explanation a modest increase from 3% to 3.5% market share for Microsoft.
On Google’s legal team, they argued that Bing’s lower market share is a result of Microsoft’s self-inflicted mistakes, particularly during the time when Google launched its superior Chrome browser. Nadella responded that Google has done an excellent job in creating a browser.
This case is expected to last approximately 10 weeks and marks the first antitrust lawsuit filed by the Department of Justice since the 90s against Microsoft.
TLDR: Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has joined the antitrust case against Google initiated by the United States Department of Justice. Nadella addressed the deal between Google and Apple, which makes it difficult for users to switch from Google’s search engine. He also acknowledged the challenges in disrupting Google’s dominant market position using AI innovation. The case is expected to last 10 weeks.
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