"In the biggest antitrust challenge it ever faced, a US court in Washington, DC, found that it illegally monopolized the search market with huge payments to other companies to ensure its search engine was the default option, which effectively blocked other competitors. With this ruling, the US Department of Justice wanted to force Google to sell its lucrative Chrome browser or Android operating system."
""The emergence of generative AI changed the course of this case," Mehta wrote on the first page of his judgment. When the case first started in 2020, AI was less of a topic. Today, it is nearly impossible to avoid. There are concerns in the industry that AI-powered search engines could massively disrupt, if not replace, conventional search engines, a threat the judge now accepts as a real possibility."
A US court found that Google illegally monopolized the search market by paying partners to make its engine the default, prompting DOJ efforts to force sale of Chrome or Android. Judge Amit Mehta issued a 230-page memorandum on September 2, 2025, ruling against breaking up Google but ordering information sharing with rivals and creation of an oversight compliance committee. Mehta concluded that the rapid emergence of generative AI, with tens of millions of users and proliferating AI chatbots, had significantly altered the search market. The judge accepted that AI-powered search could disrupt or replace conventional search, supporting less structural remedies.
Read at www.dw.com
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