A year after a US district court found Google guilty of illegally maintaining its search monopoly, Judge Amit Mehta is preparing a remedy that could range from bans on default deals to the “nuclear” option of forcing divestitures such as Chrome — or even parts of Android. The decision, expected imminently, will not only redraw the economics of search; it will set the competitive ground rules for artificial intelligence, the new gateway to information. If the court opens distribution and data to rivals, AI markets could become genuinely contestable; if it shirks the task, dominance in search will be laundered into dominance in AI.
The liability ruling was clear: Google unlawfully maintained monopolies in general search and general text ads, chiefly by paying to be the default engine on devices and browsers and by bundling access points that foreclosed rivals. Those payments were vast — $26.3 billion in 2021 alone to secure default status. The remedy menu before the court includes prohibiting exclusivity and default payments, mandating “choice screens,” requiring data and interoperability access, and stringent structural measures. Each has pedigree in the record and in plaintiffs’ filings; each targets the bottlenecks through which Google’s power flows.
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Consider the market structure the ruling addressed: Google’s global search share still hovers around 90%, barely dented despite a turbulent year for Big Tech. Such concentration is not illegal per se, but when sustained by pay-to-be-default contracts and self-reinforcing data advantages, it becomes an antitrust problem — and a policy problem — because scale in search translates into scale in training data and distribution for AI assistants.
Alphabet’s exposure and the price of separation
Alphabet’s numbers reveal the stakes. In the June quarter, “Search & Other” generated roughly $54.2 billion of revenue — well over half of Alphabet’s total — funding YouTube, Cloud, and a costly AI build-out. A remedy that curbs default deals would lift customer-acquisition costs; a breakup that splits Chrome from Search would hit the flywheel that feeds query volume and ad monetisation. None of this means the court should flinch; it means the court must calibrate. A remedy that opens distribution without degrading product quality will preserve incentives to invest while dismantling exclusionary moats.
Google warns of consumer harm, privacy risk, and “broken” products if Chrome or Android are carved away. Some of that is advocacy — as it was when Microsoft argued two decades ago that tying Internet Explorer to Windows was essential to user security — but the technical and privacy challenges of data-sharing mandates are real. The court’s own record contemplates both structural and behavioural tools, including time-bound data-access obligations with strong privacy guardrails and an independent technical monitor. Done well, these would widen the playing field without expropriating Google’s IP.
Defaults decide who gets to compete
The search case is already reshaping AI competition. Apple integrated ChatGPT into “Apple Intelligence” and, under scrutiny, has so far declined the kind of default-for-cash arrangement that made Google’s search ubiquitous. Recent reporting suggests Cupertino is also exploring a custom Gemini tie-up, highlighting how choice among AI partners is suddenly in play when the default cheque book is closed. A remedy that bans exclusivity and requires effective choice screens — tested, audited, and renewed periodically — would preserve that openness as AI assistants become the “first hop” for queries, shopping, and news.
The court record also contemplates data and interoperability remedies: rivals could gain access to index, query, and ad-auction data on fair, privacy-respecting terms, reducing the cold-start disadvantage in relevance and monetisation. The aim is not to equalise outcomes but to remove artificial barriers to entry. Without such access, even well-financed challengers will struggle to match quality, reinforcing user inertia and advertiser lock-in.
Beyond Google: the spillovers to Big Tech
A muscular remedy would reverberate across the sector. Microsoft, with a minority share in search but a commanding enterprise AI position, would gain distribution opportunities on mobile if defaults open up. Apple’s bargaining power would shift from rent-collecting defaults to user-centric design of on-device assistants. Meta would find it easier to distribute AI helpers without gateway tolls.
And every startup—from Perplexity to independent vertical engines—would face a fairer fight for attention and ad spend. In parallel, Google faces a separate DOJ win on ad-tech monopolisation, where proposed remedies include divesting AdX/DFP and curbs on self-preferencing. Two simultaneous compliance programmes—search and ads—would change Alphabet’s cost structure and strategy, even if a full breakup is stayed on appeal.
Innovation, investment, and regulation
For the US economy, the trade-off is stark. Over-deterrence could chill R&D incentives just as firms are pouring capital into AI and data-centre infrastructure. Under-deterrence would ossify a gateway market that conditions who innovates at the edge. Internationally, the decision will echo into G7 enforcement, where ex-ante digital rules (DMA in the EU, Section 19a in Germany, and UK/JP tools) already push toward interoperability, neutrality, and open access. Convergence around non-discriminatory distribution and measured data portability would reduce compliance fragmentation and support global contestability.
Publishers and SMEs will watch the ad-tech remedy just as closely. If the court compels auction transparency and curbs tying between ad server and exchange, margins could shift down the stack toward content creators and app developers. That, in turn, would support local news ecosystems and small-business marketing—an outcome with tangible macro benefits beyond headline Big Tech valuations.
A prudent path to competition
What should the court do? First, end default payments and exclusivity across devices and access points, and require effective, audited choice screens at initial setup and at reasonable intervals thereafter. Defaults matter; forced periodic choice counters inertia without mandating outcomes. Second, order targeted data-access and interoperability obligations where scale advantages are insurmountable without access—index snippets, freshness signals, and ad-auction transparency—subject to strict privacy, consent, and security rules, and sunset them unless renewed on evidence of need. Third, prohibit retaliation against distributors that carry rivals and appoint a technical compliance monitor with authority to test user flows and search-quality impacts.
Fourth, hold structural remedies—divesting Chrome or parts of Android—in reserve as a credible backstop, triggered if behavioural measures are gamed or if choice and data-access fail demonstrably to restore competition. The court need not design the market; it must remove the choke points that keep it from working. Finally, sequence remedies to avoid destabilising the information economy: phase in choice and contract prohibitions quickly; phase in data-access with privacy engineering; take up structural separation only if necessary and with clear migration paths for developers and advertisers.
Antitrust is not a morality play. It is an exercise in industrial organisation with consequences for innovation, security, and growth. Judge Mehta’s task is to move a concentrated, path-dependent market onto a more competitive trajectory without smashing what works. Ban the exclusion, open the doorways, share the minimum data needed to compete, watch closely, and escalate only if evasion follows. That is how to nurture rivalry in AI, discipline gatekeepers, and protect consumers—while keeping the dynamism that made America the hub of the digital economy in the first place.