US antitrust lawyers are calling on a judge to force the sale of Google’s Chrome browser to stabilize the company’s market share in a move that shakes up the internet giant.
On Wednesday, the US Department of Justice submitted its recommendation for a divorce to US District Court Judge Amit Mehta, who plans to take steps next year to address Google’s monopoly on online searches.
– Blowing up Google? –
“This would be a big punch for Google,” said Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives.
Google offers free search, monetization from targeted advertising and features that promote online commerce.
“It could dramatically change (Google’s) business model,” said Syracuse University marketing professor Beth Egan.
Selling Chrome would deprive Google of a rich source of information used to train its algorithms and develop its other services like Maps.
Launched in 2008, Chrome dominates the browser market, competing with Edge and Safari, developed by Microsoft and Apple, respectively.
Egan believed that Google would find a way to recover if it was forced to sell Chrome.
“I don’t think removing the browser will kill Google as a company,” Egan said.
He noted that it may be its users who end up suffering, given the story Google is doing in blogs about this issue.
– What is Chrome worth? –
A Bloomberg analyst estimates that Chrome, which is used by more than 3 billion people worldwide, could be sold for as much as $15 billion.
But with the lack of a model, predicting how much Chrome would take on the market is difficult.
A Chinese investment group bought the internet browser from Norway’s Opera Software ASA for $600 million in 2016, but it only got 350 million users at the time.
– Who would buy it? –
There are few potential buyers of Chrome, according to Emarketer senior analyst Evelyn Mitchell-Wolf.
“It’s possible that any company with deep enough pockets to buy Chrome is already under antitrust scrutiny,” Mitchell-Wolf said.
“If I had to guess, my wish is to look at US-based artificial intelligence players.”
While Chrome being bought by OpenAI enthusiasts would raise doubts, the US government could see it as a way for the country to start valuing the technology on a global scale.
Elon Musk’s first AI could be a competitor to Chrome, paid for with his wealth and to have the deal scrapped because of his close working relationship with incoming president Donald Trump.
– Winning over competitors? –
Analysts agreed that people will continue to use Chrome regardless of who owns it, as long as the quality does not decrease.
“This assumes that Chrome maintains its familiar features and continues to improve,” said analyst Mitchell-Wolf.
“Finding trends is a function of simplicity first, trust and knowledge second.”
The Justice Department’s argument that people use Chrome because it’s a search engine on devices is flawed, the analyst added.
– Trump factor –
Many doubt that Judge Mehta will embrace all the proposals made by the judiciary in this case.
CFRA reviewer Angelo Zino deemed the measures “excessive and should not be imposed by a court.”
The incoming Trump administration also “remains a wild card” about whether law enforcement officials would balk at the idea of cracking down on Google.
Mr. Trump in October expressed his opposition to removing Google, believing that such a move would be against US interests in the world.
“China is afraid of Google” and a divorce would hurt the company, Trump thought at the time.
Meanwhile, Trump has also accused Google of being unfair to conservatives.
tu-gc/jgc/sco