Google has reportedly spent hundreds of millions of dollars to prevent other companies from opening rival app stores.
According to a newly unredacted copy of a lawsuit thatFortnitemakerEpic Gamesfirst filed againstGooglein 2020, the company paidActivision Blizzardabout $360 million over three years,Reutersreported.
Google also agreed to payTencent-ownedLeague of LegendsstudioRiot Gamesabout $30 million over one year.
Update18th Nov 2022 / 5:11 pm
Activision Blizzard’s EVP of corporate affairs, Lulu Cheng Meservey, says the claims made in Epic’s lawsuit are false.
Epic is accusing Activision Blizzard’s partner Google of paying us not to compete with them.To be clear: that’s false.Google never asked us, pressured us, or made us agree not to compete with them - and we’ve already submitted documents and testimony disproving this nonsense.
The lawsuit, which accuses Google of anti-competitive restrictions on mobile device marketplaces, also namesNintendoandUbisoftin a list of 24 companies allegedly compensated in a bid to deter competition to its Play Store.
The deals with developers reportedly included payments for posting to YouTube and credits toward Google ads and cloud services.
Google said these deals to keep developers satisfied reflect healthy competition, Reuters reported.
Microsoftrecently outlined plans tocreate a “next generation game store” to compete with Apple and Google, aided by its proposed $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard.
The lawsuit also claimedGoogle considered launching a bid to acquire Epic Gamesin order to snuff out competition from the Fortnite maker.
It said Google discussed teaming up with Tencent, which owns a 40% stake in Epic, to gain a measure of control over the company or to potentially plan a hostile takeover.
Further reading
Epic has claimed Google was threatened by its decision to distribute Fortnite forAndroidoutside of the Play Store, a move which circumvented platform holder fees with a new direct payment option and resulted in Google removing the game from its platform.
Epic is currently appealing the result of a similar antitrust lawsuit againstApple. Last year, the judge in the caseruled against the Fortnite maker in nine of the 10 countsit had brought against the iPhone firm.
