Google Settles App Store Case With Fortnite Maker Epic

Google and Epic Games have reportedly reached an accord in a years-long antitrust battle.

As Bloomberg News reported Wednesday (Nov. 5), the dispute involved the way developers distribute and monetize apps on Google’s Android phones.

The report, citing court documents, said the precise terms of the agreement were not released. However, the settlement is happening as Google was already making court-mandated changes to the Play store to open it to competition.

It also comes weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court denied Google’s request for a temporary hold on a lower court ruling requiring the Play store changes.

Epic sued Google, alleging the tech giant monopolized the way consumers access apps on Android devices and make payments within apps. A jury sided with the Fortnite maker in 2023, with a judge last October ordering Google to download rival app stores within Google Play and to make Google Play’s app catalog available to competitors.

According to Bloomberg, the new settlement keeps much of the judge’s original orders in place, though with some differences, such as caps on commissions Google can charge for purchases outside the Play Store of 9% or 20%, depending on what kind of transaction is involved.

In addition, the settlement does away with app catalog access in favor of “registered app stores” that will receive equal treatment to the Play Store on devices that use Google’s Android operating system, the Bloomberg report said.

“At the court’s prompting, the parties have engaged in several rounds of negotiations, over several months, involving their most senior executives,” the companies said in a joint court filing. “The parties have agreed to resolve their disputes with a settlement that both parties believe will advance the evolution of the Android platform.”

In other Google news, the company announced this week that its Chrome browser can now input users’ passport, driver’s license, vehicle license plate and vehicle identification number (VIN), expanding upon the addresses, passwords and payment info Chrome can already fill in.

This update is coming at a time when browsers’ status as digital windows to the world is facing a challenge from artificial intelligence (AI). As covered here in May, AI is controlling an increasing share of the flow of information.