{"id":277862,"date":"2025-10-04T19:40:18","date_gmt":"2025-10-04T19:40:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/277862\/"},"modified":"2025-10-04T19:40:18","modified_gmt":"2025-10-04T19:40:18","slug":"breaking-up-google-is-hard-to-do","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/277862\/","title":{"rendered":"Breaking up (Google) is hard to do"},"content":{"rendered":"

Breaking up Google\u2019s ad tech monopoly is, apparently, like going to Mars or trying to replace Michael Jordan \u2014 dubiously possible and a huge amount of work.<\/p>\n

Those were some of the analogies witnesses testifying in Google\u2019s defense told a federal judge this week as the company mounts its second attempt to stave off a break up. After successfully beating that fate in the Justice Department\u2019s Search case<\/a>, Google made its case<\/a> to Virginia-based District Court Judge Leonie Brinkema to let it keep its ad tech business intact too. Along the way, Google witnesses argued it need not give up monopoly power to restore the competition it damaged, and the judge gave mixed signals about how she may rule.<\/p>\n

The DOJ spent the prior week arguing that forcing a sale of Google\u2019s AdX exchange and open sourcing part of its DoubleClick for Publishers (DFP) ad server is both technically feasible, and the only way to ensure Google doesn\u2019t find new ways to wield its dominance<\/a> at the expense of publisher customers. As Google lodged its defense, it marshalled in one executive and expert after another to explain the scale of the project, and warn that a break up may simply introduce new problems.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a massive undertaking,\u201d Google Ad Manager (GAM) Engineering Director Glenn Berntson testified. Even if a divestiture of AdX doesn\u2019t include ripping out other pieces of Google\u2019s proprietary infrastructure, he said, it\u2019s only marginally better. \u201cGoing to the moon is simpler than going to Mars.\u201d Other witnesses testified to the long list of ways Google says a break up is more difficult than it sounds: it\u2019s technically complex, it\u2019s unclear whether Google employees would actually go to work for an AdX buyer or just leave, and customers could be harmed in the process<\/a>. \u201cWe\u2019re trying to replace the Michael Jordan of databases,\u201d Google\u2019s technical expert Jason Nieh testified, pointing to just one of the many Google proprietary services the ad tech tools would need to swap if pried from the company. \u201cThere\u2019s only one Michael Jordan, and he\u2019s irreplaceable.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re trying to replace the Michael Jordan of databases\u201d<\/p>\n

Brinkema already ruled that Google illegally monopolized two markets<\/a> for ad tools publishers rely on to bring in revenue, and illegally tied them together to benefit its own business. Throughout Google\u2019s defense, it was at times easy to lose track of this. Google\u2019s economic expert Andres Lerner showed a slide similar to one Google used to argue its case in the earlier liabilities trial, meant to defend the efficiencies of AdX and DFP\u2019s close-knit nature, despite the fact that Brinkema already ruled the tie was illegal and kept publishers locked in. Google witnesses also testified about stagnating growth in open web display advertising \u2014 the market in which Google\u2019s conduct suppressed competition for a decade.<\/p>\n

What Google is (and isn\u2019t) willing to give up<\/p>\n

Targeted changes to Google\u2019s behavior are the most effective and least risky way to restore competition, Google argued throughout its case, including through external witnesses like the CEO of WikiHow<\/a> Google ad tech executive Tim Craycroft even riffed on concessions Google hadn\u2019t originally offered, saying the company would be \u201cvery open to making a formal commitment\u201d not to integrate its buying tools to directly bid into DFP. But he also wouldn\u2019t commit on the stand to lowering AdX\u2019s 20 percent take rate, which the court ruled was higher than would exist in a competitive market.<\/p>\n

\u201cI see a tension there\u201d<\/p>\n

Google won\u2019t even concede to banning some business practices it says it\u2019s not currently using. Google doesn\u2019t use data from its other businesses like YouTube or Search to power its ad tech business, it says, but it wants the option open should it become an important way to compete. In fact, Google shouldn\u2019t even have to give up its monopoly power, as long as it stops using it unfairly, according to Lerner. Later, though, he said that remedies should generally unfetter the market from anticompetitive conduct. \u201cWhich is inconsistent with the concept that some monopoly power can continue,\u201d Brinkema responded. \u201cI see a tension there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lerner also rejected the idea that a remedy should prevent Google from creating a new anticompetitive path similar, but not identical, to its illegal DFP-AdX tie, leveraging its buy-side advertiser demand to achieve dominance on the publisher side. That\u2019s because Brinkema didn\u2019t find the advertiser tool to be anticompetitive in and of itself, he said, and the way Google created it wasn\u2019t inherently illegal, either.<\/p>\n

To make its argument against this claim, the DOJ used a printout that showed several roads leading back to the word \u201cMonopoly\u201d in a big red box with Google\u2019s logo at the top, and tried to show the potential ways Google could recreate its monopoly power by going around Google\u2019s proposed remedies. \u201cAll we need now are the tokens, the little houses,\u201d Brinkema quipped.<\/p>\n

What does the judge think?<\/p>\n

A couple days earlier, Brinkema raised what she called the \u201ctwo elephants in the room\u201d about whether a break up is truly necessary. One is that by the end of these proceedings, Brinkema is expected to issue a court order over which Google could be held in contempt of court if it refuses to follow. The second is that Google already faces a barrage of lawsuits, and will likely face even more. Will any of this chasten the company?<\/p>\n

Surely even Google would likely comply with a court order restraining its behavior in the ad tech markets it monopolized, testified Rajeev Goel, CEO of rival ad exchange PubMatic. But the problem is making sure that order includes an exhaustive list of all the ways Google might figure out how to advantage itself in new or unknown ways now or in the future. When PubMatic raised a technical issue to Google it was experiencing, Goel said he couldn\u2019t know if the length of time it took to fix was due to a roadblock, or to Google\u2019s incentives to delay a solution to keep more money for itself. (A Google executive later testified about the work and regular updates it provided to PubMatic on the fix.)<\/p>\n

Brinkema\u2019s questions and comments in the last week of trial sent mixed signals about how she\u2019s thinking about the appropriate remedies, though it was hard to tell how much they gave insight to her current thinking. On the one hand, after a DOJ attorney said AT&T\u2019s break up helped accelerate the development of cell phones, Brinkema said,\u201cyeah, but we lost Bell Labs. That\u2019s what people comment on.\u201d On the other hand, she later seemed to pick up on the DOJ\u2019s witnesses hammering on the importance of structural remedies to prevent a regrowth of Google\u2019s monopoly. \u201cTalking about conduct really isn\u2019t important,\u201d she said, when what matters is preventing Google from gaining dominance again.<\/p>\n

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