Google wins lawsuit against $1.66 billion EU antitrust fine

Alphabet Inc.’s Google on Wednesday won its lawsuit against a $1.66 billion antitrust fine imposed five years ago for stifling rivals in online search advertising, a week after losing a much larger case.

In its 2019 decision, the European Commission said Google abused its dominant position to prevent websites from using brokers other than its AdSense platform to serve search ads. The practices, which it called illegal, took place between 2006 and 2016.

The General Court of the European Union, based in Luxembourg, largely agreed with the assessments of the European Union competition authority, but annulled the fine.

“The court (…) upheld most of the commission’s findings, but annulled the decision imposing a fine of nearly €1.5 billion ($1.66 billion) on Google, on the grounds in particular that it had not taken into account all relevant circumstances in its assessment of the duration of the contractual clauses that it had deemed unfair,” the judges said.

The AdSense fine, one of three that cost Google a total of about $9 billion, was triggered by a complaint from Microsoft in 2010.

Google said it amended the targeted contracts in 2016 before the Commission’s decision.

Last week, the company lost its latest fight against a $2.6 billion fine imposed for using its price comparison service to gain an unfair advantage over smaller European competitors.