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Google faces lawsuit for 'monopolization'

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Sanghamitra Kar
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SEATTLE, USA: Hagens Berman, a consumer rights class-action law firm announced that it has filed a nationwide antitrust class-action lawsuit against Google claiming the search engine giant illegally monopolized, financially and creatively stagnated the American market of internet and mobile search.

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The lawsuit alleges that Google's monopoly of these markets stems from the company's purchasing of Android mobile operating system to maintain and expand its monopoly by pre-loading its own suite of applications onto the devices by way of secret Mobile Application Distribution Agreements. According to the suit, these agreements were hidden and marked to be viewed only by attorneys.

According to the suit, Google's role in placing this suite of apps, including Google Play, and YouTube, among others, has hampered the market and kept the price of devices made by competing device manufactures like Samsung and HTC artificially high.

Steve Berman, attorney representing consumers and founding partner of Hagens Berman, said: "It's clear that Google has not achieved this monopoly through offering a better search engine, but through its strategic, anti-competitive placement, and it doesn't take a forensic economist to see that this is evidence of market manipulation.Simply put, there is no lawful, pro-competitive reason for Google to condition licenses to pre-load popular Google apps like this."

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The complaint claims that if device manufacturers bound by Google's distribution agreements were free to choose a default search engine other than Google, the overall quality of Internet search would improve.

The complaint notes that Google's monopoly not only suppresses its competition but also keeps the company itself from improving.

"This comes down to a combination of Google's power in the U.S. general mobile search market and their power in the realm of tablet and smartphone manufacturers," Berman said. "As a result of the pricing conspiracy, everyone loses. Google and its competitors face an uncompetitive, stagnant market, and consumers are forced into one option."

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The lawsuit claims Google is in violation of a variety of federal and state antitrust laws, including the Sherman Act, the Clayton Antitrust Act, California Cartwright Act and California Unfair Competition Law.

The lawsuit seeks to represent all U.S. purchasers of any Android OS mobile telephone or tablet as to which Google and the manufacturer of such device has entered into a contract or contracts, including the MADA, by which Google has conditioned the right to pre-load any application from a suite of Google applications on to manufacturer's mandatory acceptance.

The lawsuit seeks damages for individuals who have purchased these devices at an artificially high price due to Google's alleged price-fixing, anticompetitive restrictions.

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