Jurors found for Epic on all counts, a court filing showed. — Reuters
LOS ANGELES: “Fortnite” maker Epic Games has prevailed in its high-profile antitrust trial over Alphabet’s Google, which alleged the Play app store operated as an illegal monopoly.
“After four weeks of detailed court testimony, the California jury found against the Google Play monopoly on all counts,” wrote Epic chief executive officer Tim Sweeney in a post on social media site X, formerly known as Twitter.
Jurors found for Epic on all counts, a court filing showed. The court in January will begin work on what remedies to implement.
Google said it would appeal.
“We will continue to defend the Android business model and remain deeply committed to our users, partners, and the broader Android ecosystem,” Wilson White, vice-president of government affairs and public policy at Google, said in an emailed statement.
Lawyers for the two companies made their final arguments on Monday morning, after more than a month of trial in Epic’s lawsuit, which accused Google taking action to quash competitors and charging unduly high fees of up to 30% to app developers.
Among the compnay’s allegations were that Google illegally tied together its Play Store and billing service, meaning developers were required to use both to have their apps included in the store. — Reuters
