Google faces another DOJ antitrust lawsuit over alleged ad-tech monopoly

Google is set to face its second antitrust trial since September 2023 against the Department of Justice on Monday, this time over its alleged monopolistic power in the ad-tech industry.

The DOJ is filing a lawsuit against Google arguing their advertising technology services creates an unequal field for their competitors and has allowed them to create a monopoly in the advertising space, leading to higher ad prices for customers. 

For Google, their ad-tech service revenue accounts for 77% of their total earnings. The tech giant brought in a total of $307 billion in 2023, but $237 billion of that was produced through Google’s advertising services, according to Google’s annual revenue report.

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This is coming as a judge ruled in August that Google created a monopoly in the search engine space, forcing their competitors such as, DuckDuckGo, Bing and Yelp, to deal with anticompetitive practices. In a failing argument, Google claimed their search engine was such a superior product, and they shouldn’t be held responsible for their competitors’ inferior practices, which is a similar argument they are expected to make in this upcoming hearing.

In the advertising sector of Google, they operate the buying, selling and largest ad exchange, which has many critics saying is an unfair practice. The DOJ cited a Google advertising executive comparing it to “if Goldman or Citibank owned the NYSE (New York Stock Exchange).”

25 May 2023, Berlin: Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet, attends a press event to announce Google as the new official partner of the Women’s National Team at Google Berlin.  (Photo by Christoph Soeder/picture alliance via Getty Images / Getty Images)

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In the court filings, the DOJ argued Google, “forced key competitors to abandon the market for ad tech tools, dissuaded potential competitors from joining the market, and left Google’s few remaining competitors marginalized and unfairly disadvantaged.” Google’s response to these claims in the expected arguments they will argue that this lawsuit is a “Backward looking case” and “out of touch with reality.”

The trial will be held in Alexandria, Virginia, where the trial is expected to last many weeks.

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A mobile phone is displaying a Google search in Colombo, Sri Lanka, on January 23, 2024.  (Photo by Thilina Kaluthotage/NurPhoto via Getty Images / Getty Images)

As the final steps for the search engine case are beginning, the judge is working with both sides to determine the timeline to find a remedy to the case. The DOJ is expected to provide a detailed remedy proposal to Google by the end of the year. The judge says there will need to be a solution by August 2025.