News: Tentative Settlement in Google Play Direct-to-Consumer Antitrust Lawsuit Posted -
The day before, on Sept. 6, an elusive settlement was agreed upon in the class action lawsuit filed by 37 U.S. states against Alphabet's Google.
Below are the most important details regarding the situation and what it could be for companies that offer an online product through Google's U.S. Play Store.
What exactly is the Google antitrust lawsuit?
In Utah v. Google, 37 attorneys general claim that Google is using illegal, anticompetitive, and/or unfair commercial methods that restrict the market, increase costs, and make it difficult to choose, all of which affect consumers who purchase games or other digital products on Google Play. Google Play store.
It was brought by Utah Attorney General Sean D. Reyes, the suit alleges "exclusionary actions relating to Google Play Store for Android," with actions such as closing other apps distribution channels, and demanding the use of Google Billing (with up to 30% of the commission going to Google).
The lawsuit is led by AGs who are located in New York, North Carolina, and Tennessee, and the 37 AGs comprise 21 million consumers who are affected by the suit.
What happened recently within the Google antitrust case?
The settlement has been disclosed, but details are not yet available. The court has to decide whether to approve the settlement. However, parties to the agreement (including the Utah's AG) are asking for the Nov. 6 trial be canceled.
Google had denied wrongdoing and had not commented on this new development.
There's no timeline for when information are expected to be made public, however as it's the result of a class action suit it is likely that the information will be released once the lawsuit is concluded.
What can this mean for game or app developers in the US or other countries?
If the conditions of the settlement include relaxing Google's current Play Store restrictions and the necessity to make use of Google Billing which is a payment method, it could be an enormous victory for game and app developers looking to diversify how they sell their apps by adopting cheaper, direct-to-consumer payment methods similar to .
According to a statement published on Utah Attorney General Sean D. Reyes' website the 30% Google commission "is more than what consumers would pay in the event they had the option to choose the Google's rival instead." The lawsuit says Google has not kept its promise to maintain Android "open source" to ensure that device makers and developers of apps could design and develop apps without unnecessary limitations.
We will not know the complete implications until the terms of the settlement are officially announced.
What about Apple?
You may already be familiar with Epic Games' case against Apple regarding similar issues. Following the time that Epic offered Fortnite users to use its own payment system, providing discounts, both Apple as well as Google took down Fortnite from their apps stores. Epic then sued both Apple as well as Google in two separate lawsuits.
The last month of April, a 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals decided on the Apple decision with mixed outcomes. The court sided with Apple in determining that its App Store doesn't violate the federal antitrust laws. However, they also agreed with the ruling of a lower court in favor of Epic and ruled that Apple's ban on the app developer from directing customers to alternatives to App Store payment options violated California's Unfair Competition Law.
Epic petitioned the U.S. Supreme court to allow the injunction to take effect and to force Apple to alter the App Store policies however Apple continues to appeal the ruling. But in August, the SCOTUS ruled against Epic's request which suggested that any adjustments may not be implemented until appeals have been concluded.
Epic is not part of the Utah v. Google case, since they're in their own legal case (with Match Group) against Google. But Epic's chief executive Tim Sweeney posted on social media that "If Google is ending its payment monopoly, without having to impose the Google Tax on third party transactions, we'll settle and be Google's friend in their new age."
How can it help game developers by facilitating direct-to-consumer transactions and subscriptions?
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The Utah Attorney General's website contains additional resources related to this issue.