A US judge has ordered Google to overhaul its mobile app business to make it easier for developers of mobile-app stores to compete on phones and tablets that use the company’s Android software.

Judge James Donato’s final ruling in Epic versus Google results from Google losing an antitrust case — filed by Fortnite game developer Epic Games — during a jury trial last December.

What has Epic won?

The judge ordered Google to open up the Google Play app store to competition for three years during which the company will have to distribute rival third-party app stores within Google Play, besides rival third-party app stores getting access to the entire catalogue of Google Play apps.

Google also has to allow app makers to charge users with their own billing systems (outside of the Android ecosystem), allow Android developers to tell users about other ways to pay from within the Play Store and let Android developers link to ways to download their apps outside the Play Store.

Starting in November, for three years, Google will not be able to: Pay companies to launch apps exclusively or first on Google Play, pay companies to not compete with Google Play, and pay companies to pre-install Google Play on new devices.

Where is it applicable?

The order applies only to the US as the judge said he didn’t want to interfere with investigations into Google in other countries.

Google’s next step

Google said it will appeal the verdict while the ruling takes effect from November 1. The tech giant said it “will ask the courts to pause Epic’s requested changes, pending that appeal” and it would argue for a broader definition of the mobile-app market in its appeal. Android already allows the downloading of competing app stores, it said. “Android has helped expand choice, reduce prices and democratise access to smartphones and apps,” Google wrote in a blog post. “The initial decision and today’s Epic-requested changes put that at risk and undercut Android’s ability to compete with Apple’s iOS.”

Why did Google lose?

Epic Games originally sued Google and Apple on the same day — August 13, 2020 — after springing a trap on the tech giants by attempting to bypass their 30 per cent fee on in-app purchases with an update to its game Fortnite. The Apple case is over with the Cupertino-based company mostly winning and the Supreme Court rejected Epic’s final appeal this January.

There are key differences in the approach to the legal arguments involving Google and Apple. Apple sells the iPhone and is the developer of iOS. Google doesn’t sell, for example, Samsung Galaxy phones; it builds the Google ecosystem within Android by sharing its advertising and app store profits. Further, the case for Google was before a jury, allowing Epic to highlight documents about complicated business dealsx.

Google has two more important cases to tackle in the US. Last week, Epic sued Google (again) and Samsung, alleging they colluded to make it too difficult for consumers to download app stores from outside software developers on Android phones made by Samsung. Both companies said the lawsuit was without merit. The other case involves the justice department questioning the dominance of the Google search engine.