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EU Lawmakers Press Brussels to Keep Breakup Option Open in Google Ad-Tech Case

By  |  September 6, 2026
Google G on phone screen with EU stars

European lawmakers are urging the European Commission to preserve the option of structural remedies against Google in its ad-technology enforcement, signaling that Brussels should not necessarily follow the approach taken by a U.S. court.

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    Members of the European Parliament have called on the European Union’s executive arm to chart its own course in the Google ad-tech case after a U.S. court declined to break up the company’s advertising-technology business, according to a Sept. 4 report by Global Competition Review.

    The intervention highlights the continuing debate over how far competition authorities should go when addressing alleged market-power abuses by large technology companies. Structural remedies — which can include requiring a company to sell businesses or assets — represent one of the most consequential tools available to antitrust regulators.

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    According to Global Competition Review, the European lawmakers’ position is that the Commission should not exclude such measures simply because the U.S. litigation produced a different outcome. The report said lawmakers urged European authorities to maintain an independent approach to the question of remedies.

    Related: Google Play Antitrust US Settlement vs. the EU’s €4.1 Billion Fine: Litigation or Regulation – Which Actually Stops a Monopoly?

    The issue comes as European competition officials confront the practical and political difficulties associated with structural antitrust remedies. In separate reporting published the same day, Global Competition Review said the director general of the Commission’s competition department described structural remedies involving businesses that have already been fully integrated following an acquisition as difficult to implement and potentially politically contested.

    That tension puts Brussels at the center of a broader question confronting antitrust authorities: whether restrictions on corporate conduct are sufficient to address competition concerns in digital markets, or whether some cases warrant changes to the structure of the companies themselves.

    The Commission has continued to scrutinize Google across digital markets. Global Competition Review reported separately on Sept. 1 that Google planned to allow publishers to opt out of its artificial-intelligence services without affecting their rankings in Search, a measure the company hoped would address another EU abuse-of-dominance investigation.

    Source: Global Competition Review