| This article is about an antitrust case brought by Texas, 14 other US states, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico against Google alleging that they compete unfairly. From the filing: VII. ANTICOMPETITIVE CONDUCT Google forces publishers to license Google’s ad server and trade in Google’s ad exchange Google uses its control over publishers’ inventory to block exchange competition Google blocks publishers from sending their inventory to more than one marketplace at a time Google blocks competition from non-Google exchanges and deceives publishers about Dynamic Allocation Google restricts information to foreclose competition and advantage itself Information asymmetry causes publishers and advertisers to trade on non-Google exchanges at their own risk Google forecloses competition by using inside information to win auctions Google blocks competing exchanges from accessing publishers’ high-value inventory and reaps the benefits for itself A new industry innovation called “header bidding” promotes exchange competition; Google wants to kill it Header bidding facilitates competition among ad exchanges
Google creates an alternative to header bidding that secretly stacks the deck in Google’s favor Facebook helps Google “kill” header bidding with an unlawful agreement Google gives Facebook a leg up in its auctions in return for Facebook backing off from header bidding. Google and Facebook agree in the Jedi Blue agreement to a secret “Win Rate.” Google forces market participants to re-route trading through Google Google trades ahead of bid orders to foreclose exchange competition Google deceives exchanges to forgo header bidding Google deceives publishers to disable rival exchanges in header bidding Google cripples publishers’ ability to measure the success of rival exchanges in header bidding. Google obstructs publishers’ use of header bidding through caps Google uses its scale in search to punish publishers that use header bidding Google’s ad server gives exchanges that forego header bidding a leg up Google excludes competition through “nontransparent pricing.” |