Home Technology Google to unbundle Android apps in Europe following an antitrust ruling

Google to unbundle Android apps in Europe following an antitrust ruling

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Success breeds success, but success also means that everyone else wants a piece of your success too. Google has become one of the world’s most successful companies thanks to their innovative software and ideas. And while they will remain the internet search kings for a fair amount of time, perhaps the biggest feather in their cap has been Android. The open-source operating system based on Linux that they modified to run on mobile devices has gone on to become the OS of choice for manufacturers that aren’t Apple and has seen the company dominate the OS market as a result.

However, much like Microsoft back in the days of Windows dominance, that has also meant that they have attracted the attention of governments with antitrust concerns, which will now see Google needing to change their “uncompetitive behaviour”. As with Microsoft, it’s the European Commission that is most concerned about the company’s dominance and as a result, they have ruled that because Google requires Android phone and tablet makers to install Chrome and search to install the rest of the apps, that it is creating barriers for competitors to enter the market. This is not the first time that Google has been tagged with anti-competitive behaviours by the commission and it’s probably not going to be the last either.

To be fair, the European Commission does have a point, though it does also feel a little heavy-handed that a company is essentially getting hounded for being too successful. Still, it’s at least a consistent line from the Commission who ruled in the same with Microsoft in the past for their forced insistence that Internet Explorer was the standard browser on all Windows machines. A ruling that funny enough made it easier for Google Chrome to gain a bigger dominance in the browser space as well.

According to The Verge, Google is reportedly appealing the ruling though I suspect they may struggle to get it overturned.  In the meantime, they will have to make changes to how they license their suite of Android apps and services in Europe. That means potentially seeing their base suite of apps — Gmail, YouTube, and critically, the Play Store, among others — no longer becoming standard on Android devices and allowing companies to add those apps without adding Chrome and search.

Much like Google gained from the Microsoft antitrust ruling, its possible we could see newer players coming into the market in the near future potentially giving users even more choice of software when selecting an Android device.

Last Updated: October 22, 2018

21 Comments

  1. konfab

    October 22, 2018 at 08:32

    That is all well and good, but I would like to see these anti-trust laws being applied to Apple as well. iOS for example will not allow camera and microphone access to any browser other than Safari.

    Reply

    • Pariah

      October 22, 2018 at 09:01

      Apple is the veritable king of anti-trust and anti-competitive behaviour. I’ll never support them.

      Reply

  2. Gavin Mannion

    October 22, 2018 at 08:47

    I doubt they will be forced to remove the playstore. Personally I think Google’s gotten so big they need to be split into 3 companies. Search, advertising and Android.

    Reply

    • Admiral Chief

      October 22, 2018 at 09:05

      But aren’t they already all split under the Alphabet Inc?

      Reply

      • Gavin Mannion

        October 22, 2018 at 09:44

        kind off, that is done by choice the same was FNB Homeloans and FNB Credit Cards are split. It’s not a forced split. Multiple companies have been forcefully split by governments over the years to break up monopolies. I think Google, Microsoft and Amazon should all be split

        Some splits are easier than others

        Amazon = Retail and Cloud services can be split
        Microsoft = Office can be spun off from the rest
        Google = Search, Advertising and Android are all very seperate. Not sure who gets the left overs though

        Reply

        • Admiral Chief

          October 22, 2018 at 10:17

          Microsoft:
          – OS’s
          – Apps
          – Hosting

          Could work

          Reply

          • Gavin Mannion

            October 22, 2018 at 11:07

            Azure could definitely be spun off… none of the apps really make them money so they will likely stay with the OS department.

            The other massive one is the development side but they have released nearly everything as open source now so they wouldn’t be able to stand on their own two feet now

        • HvR

          October 22, 2018 at 10:19

          Yeah M$ will never be broken up.

          They were effectively given a free pass to do what they want and ignore laws after the slap on the wrist after the 90’s/2000’s antitrust case

          Reply

      • HvR

        October 22, 2018 at 10:31

        Like Amazon they are all just subsidiaries of the holding company so not in anyway independent

        Reply

  3. Pariah

    October 22, 2018 at 09:03

    The Play store is intrinsically tied to the OS so I don’t think that will go, but the other apps perhaps. It always seemed annoying how a phone comes with Facebook and YouTube by default.

    Reply

    • Geoffrey Tim

      October 22, 2018 at 10:17

      It isn’t though. Amazon’s fire devices, for example, Don’t ship with the Play Store – and rather have their own proprietary store. Same for quite a few chinese Android handsets. they have their own stores (you can sideload play store though)

      Reply

      • Pariah

        October 22, 2018 at 10:33

        O_o Today I learned.

        Surely though those stores don’t have anywhere near the same library / support as the Play store? Also for China you can sort of expect that. Still, didn’t know this.

        Reply

        • Geoffrey Tim

          October 22, 2018 at 10:39

          they actually have pretttttttttttty big libraries. Some of them even have more (but that’s because they’re not as regulated)

          Reply

        • HvR

          October 22, 2018 at 10:51

          The store is app is nothing more than an lightweight interface for the application package manager of the OS, each app is pretty much the same just have a different sets of server addresses.

          Reply

  4. Raptor Rants

    October 22, 2018 at 13:07

    Interesting. However this does beg the question now from a user end. How will this affect setup and first time use?

    Do I now have to spend even more data on loading what I need? What if I like my Google access all in one place with a convenient one time sign in?

    So I think it’s good to be able to separate the forced apps, it can also be a hindrance for some.

    Does this also mean that iOS needs to remove safari as their default browser from their devices?

    Reply

  5. Magoo

    October 22, 2018 at 13:17

    – doesn’t come with playstore or browser
    – no way to search for or download playstore or browser

    Reply

    • Magoo

      October 22, 2018 at 15:17

      I’m joking of course.

      Reply

  6. Magoo

    October 22, 2018 at 13:19

    Doesn’t make sense to me. Android as a platform and software, even though it’s open source, is still wholly owned by the company. The ability to use third party apps like Firefox mobile is a feature, not a requirement.

    Did we sue Nokia because we couldn’t use chrome on Symbian?

    Reply

    • HvR

      October 22, 2018 at 14:06

      Because like Apple’s iOS, Symbian wasn’t licensed to a third party manufacturers.

      Also Nokia never owned browser, search and other services so never used their hardware dominance as an advantage in other markets

      Also some technicalities, large parts (usually anything relating to the interfacing with hardware) is not open source and licensed under GPL and Google does not own the modfied Linux Kernel

      Reply

  7. Domjan

    October 23, 2018 at 15:54

    Google already giving this platform free to whoever manufacturers want to use it. Why should they be told their browser cannot be used? Same as Apple. Their Safari browser is for Apple platform. Other browsers can be downloaded from either playstore but they must make it so that you can uninstall it permanently

    Reply

    • HvR

      October 23, 2018 at 16:42

      The article doesn’t really make it clear what Google did wrong and why it ruled uncompetitive.

      Google forced through licensing (although it is free … for now) you still needed to get a license and abide by the rules and part of the rules for the last 4 years is Chrome, Search and other Google Mobile service only NO other alternatives.

      So with the ruling they are still allowed to ship Chrome and other mobile services with Android BUT they should give the manufactures an option not to do it. So most likely licensing fees will from now on apply with discount given if you ship with Google Mobile Services.

      Reply

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