Report: DoJ Preparing Antitrust Investigation of Google
MOUNTAIN VIEW (KPIX) -- Silicon Valley tech giant Google may be at the center of an antitrust investigation by the Department of Justice, according to the Wall Street Journal.
"Anytime companies succeed they grow in size and scale to the point where they achieve monopoly profits," said Russ Hancock, CEO of Joint Silicon Valley.
"At some point people cry foul and say 'this needs to be broken up, there's too much power here, there's too much concentration, there's too much influence' and that's what's driving the Department of Justice."
According to the Wall Street Journal and other reports, Google may be investigated for its web search and other businesses.
"To see if there's some breach of the rules of the game," Hancock said.
Google is no stranger to antitrust probes. Just this past March, the European Union fined the company nearly $1.7 billion for its advertising behavior.
"Let's not forget that Microsoft went through this with government regulators," said Techtarget.com contributing editor David Needle.
Twenty years ago, Microsoft's Bill Gates stepped down amid an antitrust investigation after accusations the company was abusing its monopoly power. That led to several rules the company was forced to follow for years.
"What a lot of people miss is that it's OK to be a monopoly, you can legally be a monopoly but it's what you do with that -- whether you abuse that power," said Needle.
With Alphabet subsidiary Google dominating a majority of the search engine market (Alphabet raked in nearly $140 billion in revenue last year alone) there are calls by politicians to break up big companies, like Google.
"If there's a startup company, even a medium-size company, that's doing something significant, interesting or potentially disruptive or ... competitive, these companies can just buy them and they're doing that," Hancock said. "They've been going on buying sprees -- buying all these companies and the regulators are saying that's also anti competitive."
"Consumers need a choice," said Needle. "That's really the bottom line."
KPIX reached out to Google for a comment, and have yet to get a response.