Court testimony reveals how much Google paid Apple to be Safari’s default search engine،
Thanks to the US antitrust lawsuit against Google, we are finally getting more precise information on how much the Alphabet subsidiary spends to ensure that its search engine is the default on various phones and browsers. Testimony during the trial revealed that in 2021, the company spent a whopping $26.3 billion on this “privilege.” Since we know Alphabet isn’t in the business of giving away money, we have to assume that spending that money generated higher ad revenue.
As discussed by
The edge, the figure was revealed in the courtroom during cross-examination of Google search chief Prabhakar Raghavan by the DOJ. The figure was made public after talks between the two sides and Justice Amit Mehta to discuss whether that number should be redacted to hide it from the public. The judge reportedly sought to keep the public informed of certain information revealed during the trial.
Alphabet recently released its third quarter results and for the three months ending on the last day of September, Google search generated more than $44 billion in advertising revenue. Over the past year, Search Network revenues exceeded $165 billion. It’s obvious that Google is making a wise investment in paying billions and billions to manufacturers to become the default search engine on their devices, websites and apps.
Google Search app on iOS 17.1
So far we haven’t answered the one question you came here for. How much does Google pay Apple each year to be the default search engine in Safari?
The New York Times recently reported that Google paid $18 billion to Apple in 2021. Other large payments are made to
Samsung to be the default search engine on Galaxy devices, to Mozilla so it can be the search engine by default on the Firefox browser, and to other device manufacturers, wirelessly. suppliers and platforms.
As you might expect from a defendant in an antitrust trial, Raghavan, Google’s head of search, played up competition by testifying that Yelp and Amazon should be considered competitors. He said Google is also losing search users to TikTok and ChatGPT and some users call Google Search “Granddaddy Google.” We’d say Grandpa is lively for his age. Raghavan says that with all the competition Google faces in search, it needs to do everything it can to stay competitive.
Judge Mehta will make his decision once Google has finished telling its side of the story. If he rules against Google, the company could be forced to split into smaller companies.
