The Department of Justice is continuing its crusade against a leading American tech company at a pivotal time for global competition. Recently, the DOJ failed to have a judge demand Google sell off its Chrome browser or Android operating system over concerns about the company’s search engine. Judge Mehta pointed to dynamism and evolving market conditions like the rise of AI as a reason that Google Search faces many competitive pressures and that the search engine market does not need the government involved. But unfortunately the DOJ is trying again, this time over a case regarding Google’s advertising services.
Much like in the search case, the DOJ is demanding Google divide up its advertising business. The DOJ wants courts to force Google to undo previous acquisitions despite the fact those acquisitions have already been found to not endanger competition.
Such a move would mean online publishers and small business advertisers would have to grapple with a more complicated ad market, instead of enjoying the integrated suite of services Google provides today. Integrated advertising services are one-stop ad shops for small enterprises and entrepreneurs of all types, and it is their integrated nature that makes them so valuable to their customers. These benefits of scaled firms like Google are all too often ignored by antitrust regulators.
Google’s innovations in advertising tech have done wonders to level the playing field for small businesses and entrepreneurs against much larger rivals. Instead of needing the scale, resources, and expensive advertising firms to blanket entire media markets with ads in the hope of reaching potential customers, smaller firms can create, place, and precisely target ads with a much higher return on investment all on their own. This has had an undeniably positive impact on competition across the economy. Artisans in their garage can go toe-to-toe with major retailers.
Complicating this helpful dynamic by breaking apart Google is not a worthwhile tradeoff. The reason for this is that Google’s share of the online advertising market continues to decline. Meanwhile, Amazon is showing healthy growth in the space and is quickly closing the gap with Google. Much like the search case, where the AI revolution played a key role in shaping the remedies portion of the case, the Court in the ad tech case must recognize this shifting landscape. It is both impossible and not the duty of the Court to try to reshape the markets of the past. And it certainly shouldn’t attempt to do so in a way that would harm competition in countless other industries.