It'll take an international tag team to break up Google

The tech giant should be broken up, but regulators in Europe and the US must work together to ensure it’s done properly.

- Parmy Olson

Here's a bit of antitrust trivia for you. How long does it take for Europe's antitrust enforcers to punish a company once they've pointed out its misbehaviour? The answer: about a year. When the European Commission officially complained about Apple's streaming rules in February 2023, it followed that up with a €1.8 billion (S$2.6 billion) fine in March 2024. But Europe's regulators have done something odd recently. After putting their spotlight on Google's anti-competitive practices in online advertising in June 2023, they still haven't said what the penalty will be the thing everybody cares about.

Why the wait? Perhaps because the commission's complaint had an eye-catching threat: "structural remedies", a.k.a. a possible break-up of Google. It would be politically foolhardy for Europe to act alone in pushing to split up one of the biggest companies to come out of the US.

Consider the number of times Donald Trump has accused European regulators of hating America. Even former president Barack Obama has thrown shade at the continent's trust busters for being anti-American. This would just amp up the rhetoric.

The commission is probably waiting for its counterparts in Washington to make a move. Earlier in October, the Department of Justice (DOJ) told a judge it was also considering structural remedies for Google. The DOJ will release its fine-tuned proposals in November, and Judge Amit Mehta - who has already ruled that Google is a monopolist - will decide on those suggestions in August 2025. Google has said the DOJ's proposals "go far beyond" the legal issues in its case and represent "government overreach".