Source: http://precursorblog.com/?q=content/why-a-us-v-google-android-antitrust-case-stronger-us-v-microsoft
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 17:00:51+00:00

Document:
Conventional wisdom is wrong that the 2013 FTC decision to shut down its Google search bias antitrust investigation because of insufficient evidence to justify legal action, indicates there is no sufficient evidence to justify legal action in a potential U.S. antitrust case against Google-Android.
These are completely different antitrust cases alleging completely different case theories, abuses, harms, and facts.
The cumulative public evidence to date indicates that the Trump FTC/DOJ will eventually file an Android-related Sherman antitrust monopolization case against Alphabet-Google.
That is first because America’s strongest Sherman Act monopolization case and legal precedent, U.S. v. Microsoft is extraordinarily analogous to a potential U.S. v. Alphabet Android monopolization case, and second because the potential Google-Android antitrust case precedent, evidence, and harms are substantially stronger and more fully-developed than the DOJ’s successful, 1998, Sherman antitrust monopolization case against Microsoft.
This analysis will lay out the evidence why the likely eventual U.S. v. Alphabet Google-Android Sherman monopolization case is likely and is stronger than the seminal, analogous, successful, and “rock solid” U.S. antitrust precedent case of U.S. v. Microsoft.
Scrutiny of DOJ Antitrust Chief Makan Delrahim’s public speeches -- here, here, here, here, here, and here -- to august antitrust bodies indicates a sophisticated understanding and public defense: of the relevance, flexibility, and capability of the widely-adopted, Bork antitrust consumer welfare standard to address any potential digital or Internet-related monopolization case; and of the Bork-backed, “rock solid,” nature of the U.S. v. Microsoft antitrust precedent.
FTC Chairman Joe Simons has publicly promised to be a tough antitrust and consumer protection enforcer and has launched a once-in-a-generation retrospective of ~15 public hearings this fall to examine the adequacy and effectiveness of the FTC’s antitrust and consumer protection enforcement and authority, evidently focused on Internet platforms and Google. He and his fellow FTC commissioners apparently are acutely aware of the FTC’s 2013-2017 questionable antitrust non-enforcement of Google-Android.
The reasons that a potential U.S. v. Alphabet antitrust case would be stronger than the successful U.S. v. Microsoft case are briefly: a stronger precedent; a much fuller and more developed record of evidence; vastly broader monopolization and destroyed competition; and more and broader consumer harms.
Stronger precedent:First, this potential U.S v. Alphabet antitrust case would be based on a much more recent and upheld U.S. v. Microsoft precedent (1999 & 2004) than the 1951 Lorain Journal precedent.
Second, the U.S. v. Microsoft precedent is extraordinarily-analogous in terms of established market definition of the same product – a licensable software operating system, Windows and Android, but not Apple’ iOS operating system because iOS is not a direct competitor to Google’s Android operating system because iOS is not a licensable operating system and Android is.
Third, the U.S. v. Microsoft precedent is eerily-analogous in the alleged Android antitrust abuse of vertical contractual full-line forcing to foreclose actual and potential horizontal competition to its monopoly. Simply, Google brazenly used Microsoft’s monopolization playbook.
Much fuller and more developed record of evidence: First, at the time of 1998 U.S. v. Microsoft case the PC market was still emerging with less than 50% U.S. PC computer adoption, whereas now the Internet markets are mature with >90% of Americans using the Internet, 90% of Americans using Google search because Apple uses Google Search as default, and 70% of Americans use smartphones.
Second, while the FTC and DOJ investigated Microsoft formally on antitrust three times in six years from 1992 to 1998, the FTC and DOJ have investigated Google formally on antitrust ten times in 11 years from 2007-2018, which included: a threatened Sherman Act case to block the proposed Google-Yahoo ad agreement; an extraordinary approval of a #2 Yahoo and #3 Microsoft to try and create a competitor to Google Search; advice to a court to block the Google book settlement as anticompetitive; a consent decree on Google-ITA; and a settlement to not act anticompetitively with patents and with advertising practices.
Third, unlike the Microsoft case where the DOJ led, and the EU followed, in this instance the EU is leading and the FTC/DOJ following on a Google-Android matter. The EU is reportedly poised to convict Google of an Android-abuse of dominance and impose an expected record fine and substantial behavioral prohibitions.
The DOJ/FTC case can only be made stronger by learning from the EU discovery and witnessing in detail Google’s behaviors and best arguments against the EU case. Seldom does the U.S. get the benefit of a observing a foreign dry-run of their own antitrust case against an American company.
Vastly broader monopolization and destroyed competition: First, the Microsoft case was effectively contained to the tech sector, the potential U.S. v. Alphabet case implicates multiple industries outside of tech fanning most of the economy.
Second, while the Microsoft case was largely about preserving it operating system monopoly and destroying Netscape as a potential rival, a potential U.S. v. Alphabet-Google Android case could document how Google preserved its PC search-syndication/search-advertising monopoly and extending it more completely to mobile and destroyed all of Google’s major actual and potential rivals ability to compete in the process: Yahoo, Microsoft, Facebook, Apple, etc.
More and broader consumer harms: First, the Android system is well-known for a model that is good for Google and its market power, but provides poor quality security for consumers, including not being able to update consumers systems to protect them from known security flaws, and not providing normal and needed consumer tech support. In addition, Google-Android is pervasively and comprehensively tracking consumers much more than they have been informed about and without meaningful consent, all to advance the advertising-only business model over consumer welfare.
Second, Android’s permanent price fixed at zero contributes to systemic foreclosure of competitive price choices for consumers. For example, there is no a la carte pricing for privacy or security conscious consumers, despite the revealed preference that some users use ad blockers and others would pay for an ad-free, more privacy-friendly and secure Android system. There also is no business pricing to meet businesses’ different needs than consumers.
Third, Android discourages business model innovation that would conflict with its free ad-only business model, which forecloses competition for the licensable operating system market.
DOJ Antitrust Chief Makan Delrahim has been publicly laying out the Trump Administration’s antitrust doctrine as it applies to digital markets in a series of antitrust speeches -- here, here, here, here, here, and here -- that have made the case that the Bork-authored U.S. antitrust consumer welfare standard is up to the task of addressing any potential 21st century monopolization case in digital markets.
Tellingly, June 22nd at the Federalist Society, a bastion of conservative antitrust thought, Mr. Delrahim’s focused remarks made it clear that Judge Bork, the conservative lion of antitrust thought, fully supported the Clinton-DOJ’s U.S. v. Microsoft case, and that Mr. Delrahim did and does today.
The grand question here is: if Mr. Delrahim was not trying to rally support from conservatives for a potential antitrust case, most likely against Alphabet-Google on Android (after several years of Google’s relentless swarming of the antitrust community and conservatives with its de facto “Google School of No Antitrust” doctrine and its deceptive academic-antitrust influence campaign) why then did Mr. Delrahim make these particular Bork-Microsoft-precedent, concluding remarks a few weeks ago to the conservative Federalist Society’s celebration of the venerable Judge Robert H. Bork’s seminal book on antitrust?
The cumulative public evidence indicates that the Trump FTC/DOJ will eventually file an Android-related Sherman antitrust monopolization case against Alphabet-Google.

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