Multibillion-dollar Apple deal looms large in Google antitrust trial
Google has not one but two Department of Justice antitrust trials this year — and the first one, over Google Search, is finally coming to a close. On Thursday, lawyers showed up at the district court in Washington, DC, for the first of two days of closing arguments in the bench trial before Judge Amit Mehta.
This was the first tech anti-monopoly lawsuit the government had filed in two decades since US v. Microsoft. Its outcome directly affects one of the most valuable companies in the world. At this stage, the judge will only determine whether Google is liable for the antitrust charges brought against it. If so, there will be a separate proceeding to determine appropriate remedies. These could be court-ordered constraints on Google’s...