The UK’s Competition Appeal Tribunal has rejected Google’s attempt to block a $6.7bn (roughly £5bn) class action led by advertisers.
The Competition Appeal Tribunal in the UK has rejected Google’s bid to block a class action lawsuit, initiated by a group of advertisers.
The group alleged the tech giant abused its dominant position in app distribution, mobile operating systems, search and search advertising, which lead to advertisers being overcharged and competitors excluded.
Google objected to the class representative’s funding structure and cost level, the class definition, amendments to the class form, and whether the lawsuit should be opt-in or opt-out, the judgement summary stated.
Proceedings should be classified on an opt-out basis, the Tribunal concluded, and although some concerns were shared around the level of cost, this was not enough to warrant barring the certification.
This means the trial will continue as an opt-out proceeding, meaning that all eligible UK businesses will be automatically included in the claim unless they opt-out.
Lawyers representing Or Brook, the competition law academic who is acting as the class representative, have estimated that roughly 880,000 organisations are covered in the claim, which is seeking as much as £5bn in damages ($6.7bn), Reuters reported.
“[This is] an important step toward securing compensation for the many thousands of UK businesses and organisations that have been overcharged for using Google’s search advertising services,” Brook said in a statement.
Other disputes relating to class definition, as well as loss and limitation will be resolved through a letter of formalisation within the next two weeks.
Google insisted the case is “speculative and opportunistic”, and plans to “vigorously” dispute it.
In this new era of legal and regulatory pushback against big tech, Google is among the companies that has multiple lost antitrust cases.
Most recently Google was hit with a €4.1bn fine after losing an EU anti-trust battle over allegations it blocked companies from using rival Android systems by forcing phone manufacturers to pre-install Google search, the Chrome browser, and the Play app store on their Android devices.
In the US, the Alphabet-owned company has appealed a federal judge’s ruling, which found the tech giant held an illegal monopoly in online search and search advertising, claiming it won market share “fair and square”.
