Google, Mobile And Competition: The Current State Of Play

By Benjamin Edelman –

Google’s widely-used Android operating system is open source software. Any developer who wishes to examine the source code can download it in full. Any device manufacturer that wishes to install “bare Android” can do so free of any Google apps whatsoever, and subject to minimal restrictions and few obligations to Google or anyone else. Such flexibility might seem the epitome of competition. How could such methods be anticompetitive? Competition authorities have