Report from ArsTechnica
In Brief – Soon after Google began allowing the first third-party app store to be downloaded through its Play Store, US District Judge James Donato said the company had not done enough to comply with his antitrust injunction and ordered the digital giant make a series of changes to eliminate “anticompetitive frictions”. A key requirement of Donato’s antitrust remedy order is that third-party app stores be available through Google Play like other apps, giving users easier access to non-Google app sources. The first app store to test the new Google process was Aptoide Games. Epic Games argued to Donato that searches for “app store” or “Aptoide” in Google Play did not directly produce the alternative store, and that there were several more steps involved in downloading Aptoide than for other apps. The judge agreed and ordered Google to improve search results and eliminate the extra steps which Google agreed to do. Epic says that it may launch an app store in Google Play if the problems are resolved.
Context – Epic’s 2020 antitrust lawsuits against Apple and Google kicked off a global campaign to drive down app store fees. They are unquestionably winning. Google, despite a more open ecosystem, lost their US trial. Donato’s injunction required Google to allow third-party app stores to be distributed through the Google Play Store with the rival app stores gaining access to all the apps in the Play Store. Google fought the remedy and at one point teamed up with Epic behind a plan that allowed alternative app stores to be distributed through a new Registered App Store app on Android. Donato rejected the plan and Google and Epic dropped it for the US. The two are still backing it internationally. During the litigation, Donato insisted that he would not micromanage or centrally plan Google’s systems, although a little micromanagement was apparently to be expected. Apple largely won their trial, but Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, who made it clear all along that she thought Apple’s fees were too high, imposed an app store order on the iPhone giant that proved as restrictive as Judge Donato’s.