3 hours ago
1
Today, I am sitting in the courtroom that may decide the fate of Android. Epic CEO Tim Sweeney is here. Google Android boss Sameer Samat is here. Together, they’ll try to convince Judge James Donato that they’re no longer enemies — that Google’s illegal monopoly on Android app stores can be resolved with a mutual settlement instead of the consequences the judge had ordered. And I’ll be posting anything interesting I hear live in this Verge StoryStream.
Epic sued Google over five years ago in August 2020, and in December 2023 a jury unanimously handed it the win. An appeals court upheld that verdict, and the US Supreme Court didn’t step in to save Google from the immediate consequences. Judge Donato ordered Google to crack open Android in the United States, forcing Google to eventually host rival app stores inside its own store, among many other punishments.
Now, Epic and Google are giving Judge Donato two different options. If he approves the settlement as-is, Google will agree to reduce its app store fees globally, not just in the United States, making app development a better job prospect around the world, and create a Registered App Stores program where rival app stores could make it onto Android without gobs of friction — but where those stores might still be under Google’s thumb and have to pay complicated fees.
If Donato doesn’t, Google seems to be threatening an alternative that app makers and the court may like a whole lot less: if developers want to avoid Google’s payment systems, they must immediately enroll in rigid new Google programs where they pay Google multiple dollars per app download in exchange for only slightly lower app store fees.
Epic and Google are already acting like the settlement is a done deal, bringing Epic’s game Fortnite back to Android and publicly declaring their support of each other.
But Donato was publicly skeptical of the settlement, and that Google and Epic are “suddenly BFFs,” Law360’s Bonnie Eslinger reported in November. So now, he’s hauled the “lead negotiators” of the settlement into court to explain further. That’s Epic CEO Tim Sweeney himself, Google’s Android boss Sameer Samat, Epic’s expert witness in economics (and Stanford professor) Doug Bernheim, and Google regulatory affairs director Lara Kollios.
Don’t watch this specific post for updates: instead, click through to our StoryStream. It’s not likely the judge will approve the settlement today, but who knows!
Disclosure: Vox Media, The Verge’s parent company, has filed a lawsuit against Google, seeking damages from its illegal ad tech monopoly.
Follow topics and authors from this story to see more like this in your personalized homepage feed and to receive email updates.
