EU antitrust chief defends Google deal, denies gentlemen’s agreement

The EU antitrust chief, defending a deal with Google over how the search company displayed web search results, denied there had been a gentlemen's agreement to close the case. The chief's remarks came after he faced criticism from rival firms as also his own colleagues, over the arrangement.

Investigations by the European Commission in the matter have gone on for three years. The commission, which acts as the bloc's antitrust regulator, investigated complaints Google was blocking competitors in search results.

Over a dozen companies, including Microsoft, price comparison site Foundem and online mapping company Hotmaps, had accused the regulator of squeezing them out of the market.

Earlier this month, Google agreed to make concessions to display rivals' links more prominently, in hopes of putting an end to a dispute that could have led to a fine of up to $5-billion.

According to European Competition commissioner Joaquin Almunia, he would accept the company's proposals, which he termed significant concessions that allayed competition concerns.

The proposals, however, cut no ice with rival firms which said the plans failed to go far enough and would only see Google entrench its dominance of internet searches.

Meanwhile, the EU competition chief said yesterday that Google's tax optimisation strategies needed to be examined by EU authorities.

While reacting to criticism about how he had handled the current competition case against the search giant, Joaquin Almunia said other aspects of Google might cause concern, including tax optimisation, the collection and use of personal data and the use of the intellectual property of others, PC World reported.

He added that all these topics would form agenda of public authorities.

Google had been under the EC investigation since 2010, after it was accused by rivals of directing users to its own services and shutting out competition. Instead of proceeding directly to sanctions, Almunia decided to reach a so-called Article 9 agreement with Google.

An agreement of the type allowed companies to avoid fines of up to 10 per cent of their global turnover, if they made legally binding promises that the commission, considered sufficient to address the competition concerns.