The entrance to Google’s UK office in London.
Olly Curtis Future Issue | via Getty Images
LONDON – Britain’s competition watchdog on Friday issued a statement of objections to Google’s ad technology practices, which the regulator found harmed competition in Britain.
In a statement, the Competition and Markets Authority said that the US internet search titan “has undermined competition by using its dominance in online display advertising to favor its own ad technology services.”
The “majority” of thousands of publishers and advertisers in the UK use Google technology to bid and sell space to display ads in a market where players spent £1.8 billion a year in a 2019 study, according to the CMA.
The regulator added that it is also “concerned that Google is actively using its dominance in this sector to favor its own services.” The so-called “self-preferring” service by the tech giant is a major concern for regulators scrutinizing the company.
The CMA further noted that Google is putting ad tech competitors at a disadvantage, preventing them from competing on a “level playing field.”
“Many businesses can keep their digital content free or cheaper by using online advertising to generate revenue. Advertising on websites and apps reaches millions of people across the UK – helping them buy and sell goods and services,” Juliette Enser, interim director enforcement executive at the CMA, said in a statement on Friday.
“That’s why it’s so important that publishers and advertisers – who enable this free content – can benefit from effective competition and get a fair deal when buying or selling digital advertising space,” added Enser.
Google did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.
This isn’t the first time a US tech giant has been accused of abusing its dominant position in ad tech to hurt competition. In the European Union, regulators last year accused Google of violating antitrust rules in ad technology and said they may seek to break up parts of the tech giant’s business to alleviate concerns.
Stateside, a federal judge in August sided with the Justice Department over allegations that Google has held a monopoly on search and text ads for years.
The ruling – the first anti-monopoly decision against a technology company in decades – has been compared to the antitrust pronouncement against Microsoft, determining that the company illegally used the market power of the Windows operating system to eliminate competition from its rival browser, Netscape. Navigator.
In the decision of the CMA on Friday, the watchdog said that, since 2015, Google has abused its dominant position as the operator of the ad buying tools “Google Ads” and “DV360,” and the publisher’s ad server known as “DoubleClick For Publishers,” to strengthen its market position advertising exchange, AdX.
Ad exchanges are technology platforms that facilitate the buying and selling of media advertising inventory. They work by submitting requests for bids from publishers offering space to sell ads, then matching responsive bids from advertisers through an auction process.
AdX, where Google charges the highest fees to advertisers, is “the center of the ad technology stack” for the company, the CMA said, with Google taking roughly 20% of the amount for each bid processed on the platform.
