(April 28): Google was targeted by European Union (EU) watchdogs who unveiled a slate of proposals aimed at prising open its Android ecosystem to rivals’ artificial intelligence (AI) services.
The European Commission said on Monday it wants the Alphabet Inc unit to ensure “competing AI services can effectively interact with applications on users’ Android devices and execute tasks,” in order to comply with the rules.
While Monday’s proposals under the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) is a step shy from a formal investigation or order, it aims to guide the US giant into compliance with the rules. The escalation confirmed an earlier report by Bloomberg News.
The “proposed measures will give more choice to Android users about the AI services they use and integrate in their phone, including from the vast range of AI services that compete with Google’s own AI,” EU competition chief Teresa Ribera said in a statement. EU regulators added they were seeking industry feedback on the plan.
Google’s Gemini enjoys access to core features on Android, including integration and communication with a range of apps. The EU wants the company to grant an equally effective level of access to key Android features — such as voice activation technology that users can operate to activate an AI service.
In a statement, Google’s senior competition counsel Clare Kelly hit out at the EU’s measures, saying the “unwarranted intervention” could unnecessarily drive up “costs while undermining critical privacy and security protections for European users.”
See also: Musk and Altman head to trial in feud over future of OpenAI
The EU’s DMA lays out a raft of dos and don’ts for Big Tech firms and has provoked the ire of White House, being slammed by President Donald Trump as unfairly targeting American companies.
In the face of transatlantic pressure, the EU has pursued enforcement of the rulebook tentatively, having only dished out relatively modest fines of €500 million against Apple Inc and €200 million against Meta Platforms Inc so far.
The EU could later decide to start a formal probe if Google doesn’t step into line with Monday’s findings — a move that comes with its own threat of financial penalties. The Mountain View, California firm has come in for fines totaling close to €9.5 billion from the EU for abusing its dominance over the years.
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