Business | Un-appy returns

What Google’s antitrust defeat means for the app economy

Tech giants will try to defend their profit pools in the face of courts and regulators

Sundar Pichai, Google’s chief executive, speaks at the company’s annual conference.
Photograph: Jason Henry/The New York Times/Redux/Eyevine

IT TOOK less than four hours for nine jurors to reach a verdict. On December 11th in a San Francisco courthouse they unanimously agreed that Google’s app store was a monopoly and that the company had engaged in anticompetitive behaviour. The decision strikes a blow against the search giant, which is concurrently embroiled in other legal battles. It may also redefine the app-store economy.

This article appeared in the Business section of the print edition under the headline “Un-appy returns”

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