Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) has rejected the antitrust charges that have been brought against it by the European Union.
The EU watchdogs had accused Alphabet of unfair practices such as blocking its competitors in its search engine. The EU was carrying on investigations on the company to determine whether it has been using comparison shopping results and AdSense in its favor of its own products. Alphabet has disputed the claims and rejected the charges brought against it by the European regulator. The company stated that there was a lack of evidence and that the EU has a specific vision of what online shopping should be but sadly, it does not align with reality.
“People don’t solely reach merchant sites via searching for products,” stated Kent Walker, a senior VP at Alphabet subsidiary Google.
Alphabet claims that the model of online shopping that the EU expects is, regrettably, a misrepresentation of the actual online shopping scene. The firm went on to add that consumers also use specialist searches, social media sites, online ads and merchant platforms to find particular stores. Walker also stated that the accusations brought against the company do not have any economic, factual or legal basis. He also added that the actions of the firm were motivated by users and not the desire to suppress the competition.
According to the defense brought forward by Alphabet, the EU failed to consider the competition that the company has been facing from Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN), social media websites, the mobile web and online advertising from companies such as Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB).
“We never compromised the quality or relevance of the information we received. On the contrary, we improved it. That isn’t ‘favoring’—that’s listening to our customers,” added Walker.
EU spokesman Ricardo Cardoso responded in an email stating that the regulatory body will carefully consider each response from Google to decide on the way forward. He also pointed out that it was too early in the investigation to determine the final outcome.
Alphabet stock closed the latest trading session at $120.00.