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The
Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) said it was investigating
whether Google violated Japan's Antimonopoly Act by returning
part of its revenue to Android smartphone makers on the
condition they not install rival search engines.
It is also looking into Google's practice of making Android
phone makers install its "Google Search" and "Google Chrome"
browser application with the "Google Play" app.
"There is suspicion that through these steps it is excluding
competitors' business activity and restricting its business
partners' business activity in the search services market," a
JFTC official told a press conference.
The official said the issue was not that Google's service was
widely used, it was about fair competition.
"We've launched this probe wondering if the situation under
which other search engine providers' services have a hard time
being recognised as a user's choice, no matter how much
improvement has been made, is artificially created."
The decision follows similar investigations by antitrust
regulators in the European Union, the United States and others.
(Reporting by Kiyoshi Takenaka and Kantaro KomiyaEditing by
Chang-Ran Kim, Robert Birsel)
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