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Google is back in federal court this week, battling US antitrust enforcers over whether it should be forced to sell part of its multibillion-dollar online advertising business.
The US Department of Justice (DoJ) and a coalition of states want Google to divest its ad exchange platform, AdX, and make the auction mechanism behind it open source. AdX charges online publishers a 20% fee to sell ads in split-second auctions when users load websites, a practice the government argues cements Google’s monopoly power.
In opening statements, Julia Tarver Wood, an attorney with the DoJ’s antitrust division, said divestiture was the only way to restore competition after a judge ruled earlier this year that Google had illegally tied AdX to its publisher ad server.
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“Leaving Google with the motive and the means to recreate that tie is simply too great a risk,” Wood argued.
The trial, overseen by US District Judge Leonie Brinkema, will determine remedies for Google’s unlawful monopolies in digital advertising technology. Brinkema has already found the company guilty of anticompetitive conduct.
Google’s attorney Karen Dunn blasted the DoJ’s proposals as “radical and reckless”, warning they would hurt competition and give government regulators excessive control over a private technology platform.
“The DOJ would reserve to itself broad and unparalleled power, control and leverage over a major American technology platform,” Dunn said.
Google has countered with its own proposals, offering to adjust policies to make it easier for publishers to use competing platforms rather than sell AdX outright. The DoJ, however, insists that policy tweaks alone will not restore fair competition.
The trial is being closely watched by publishers and rival ad tech developers, many of whom accuse Google of stifling competition.
Grant Whitmore, an executive at Advance Local, testified that Google’s dominance across advertising tools and exchanges allows it to tilt the marketplace in its favour. He argued the DoJ’s proposals would ultimately restore balance — and even suggested that Google should also be forced to sell off its publisher ad server.
The case is part of a wider bipartisan crackdown on Big Tech, with Meta, Amazon, and Apple also facing lawsuits over alleged monopolistic practices.
The outcome could reshape the future of the online advertising industry, a market worth hundreds of billions of dollars. If Judge Brinkema sides with the DoJ, Google may be forced to part with critical infrastructure at the core of its digital ad empire—a blow rivalled only by the government’s failed bid earlier this month to break up its Chrome browser dominance.
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