Google came under fire Friday from U.K. regulators who say it is leveraging its dominance in digital advertising to thwart competition in Britain, adding to the pressure the tech giant faces on both sides of the Atlantic over its ad-tech business practices.
Britain’s Competition and Markets Authority said the U.S. company was giving preference to its own services over online publishers and advertisers in Britain’s 1.8 billion pound ($2.4 billion) digital advertising market.
Google is a major player in the entire digital advertising ecosystem, providing servers for publishers to manage advertising space on their websites and apps, tools for advertisers and media agencies to buy display ads, and an exchange where both parties come together to buy and sell ads in real time at auctions.
We have provisionally found that Google is using its market power to stifle competition when it comes to the ads people see on websites, the watchdog’s acting executive director of enforcement, Juliette Enser, said in a press release.
The watchdog’s allegations, known as a statement of objections, come two years after it opened its investigation. European Union antitrust authorities have also investigated Google’s ad bidding services and have also been the focus of a state-led antitrust lawsuit against Google that is set to go to trial this month.
The CMA said Google’s “anti-competitive” conduct continued, but the company refuted the allegations on Friday.
Google remains committed to creating value for its publisher and advertiser partners in this highly competitive sector, the company said in a prepared statement. “The core of this case is based on misconceptions about the ad tech industry. We disagree with the CMA’s view and will respond accordingly.”
The UK watchdog said Google has been exploiting its dominance since 2015 to strengthen the market position of its own ad exchange AdX and protect it from rivals. AdX is where Google charges the highest fees in the ad tech system, taking around 20 percent of the amount of bids, the CMA said.
The regulator’s allegations include accusations that Google manipulates advertisers’ bids so that they are worth more when they enter AdX auctions than on rival exchanges. AdX is also the first to bid in auctions organised by Google’s ad server for publishers, potentially excluding rivals from the opportunity to bid, the watchdog said.
Google now has the chance to respond to the allegations. The CMA said it is considering what is needed to ensure Google stops anti-competitive practices. It has the power to impose a fine of up to 10 percent of a company’s global annual revenue.
(Only the headline and image of this report may have been reworked by Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
First published: September 6, 2024 | 18:02 IS
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