Google Accuses Competition Commission of India Of Protecting Amazon In Android Case

Google has accused India's antitrust body, the Competition Commission of India (CCI), of ordering changes to its business model "only to protect" rival Amazon, which complained about its struggles to develop a modified version of the Android system due to Google's restrictions, legal papers show, according to a Reuters report.

Google has approached India's Supreme Court to quash the Competition Commission of India's (CCI) October order asking the company to make 10 changes to its business model after the CCI found it abused its dominant position in the market with its Android operating system, which powers 97% of India's smartphones.

Google's latest Supreme Court filing shows its deepening disagreement with how the CCI conducted its Android investigation.

In an earlier December filing in a lower tribunal, Google said CCI officers had "copypasted" parts of a European ruling against the U.S. firm in a similar case. CCI denied the accusation, reported Reuters.

In the CCI's October order, which also fined Google $163 million, the company was asked to allow modified versions of its Android operating system, called Android forks, to be liberally distributed without any licensing restrictions such as those related to pre-installation of Google apps.

Amazon told the CCI during the investigation that Google's restrictions hindered development of its Android fork called Fire OS, and Google said the watchdog unfairly relied on that in passing its adverse decision against it, the company said in the June 26 Supreme Court filing, added the Reuters report.

"Globally, FireOS failed commercially due to poor user experience. In India, the Fire Phone was not even launched," Google argued in its 1,004-page filing, which has not been made public but was reviewed by Reuters.

"Thus, the Commission called Amazon's lack of attempt to compete in India a failure and attributed it to Google's agreements."

The CCI's directive was issued "only to protect Amazon - who complained that its attempts at creating a forked version of the Android did not work because of (Google's) restrictions," stated the Reuters report.