US Department of Justice wields monopoly: Google (GOOGL.US) advertising business may be forcibly split

Zhitong Finance App learned that the US Department of Justice submitted documents to the federal court requiring Google (GOOGL.US) to divest two core assets in its online advertising business — ad trading platform ADx and publisher ad servers. This mandatory split requirement stems from an anti-monopoly ruling handed down by Federal District Court Judge Leonie Brink in Alexandria, Virginia this month, which found that Google had an illegal monopoly in the digital advertising exchange market and ad server sector.

The Ministry of Justice emphasized in court documents that Google has formed a closed loop ecosystem of “self-preferential treatment” by abusing its dominant position in the market for a long time. Specifically, Google is accused of providing special rights for its own advertising products, including preferential access to ad trading platform data and artificially restricting competitors' technology access, forcing advertisers and website publishers to rely heavily on its service system.

In response to the remedy, the Ministry of Justice clearly rejected the “Technology Compatibility Commitment” program proposed by Google. The plan proposed to allow ADx to exchange data with competitor systems and establish a three-year compliance monitoring period. However, the Ministry of Justice stated that such promises cannot fundamentally resolve the monopoly structure problem, and “only by divesting illegally obtained monopoly assets can the competitive order of the market be re-established.” The document specifically emphasizes that ad servers, as the “central system” of website advertising management, are deeply bundled with advertising trading platforms and must be forcibly split in stages.

Faced with the Ministry of Justice's request, Google has yet to publicly respond to the specific plan. Google proposed that compliance can be achieved through technological openness and third-party supervision, such as promising that the ADx platform will be open to all bidding systems without discrimination and subject to real-time monitoring by an independent agency for a period of three years.

This case can be traced back to an antitrust lawsuit initiated by the Ministry of Justice against Google in 2023. Last month, Judge Brinckma handed down a key ruling, finding that Google has three illegal facts in the advertising technology market: restricting competitors' access to ad servers through exclusive agreements; manipulating the ad auction mechanism to profit from its own products; and abusing its dominant position in the market to suppress price competition.

Notably, this case is linked to another lawsuit against Google's search monopoly. The Ministry of Justice is also pushing for the divestment of the Chrome browser to break Google's monopoly position on the search portal. Currently, Judge Brinckma has scheduled a hearing in September, at which time the two sides will directly debate remedies.

In response, ad technology industry analysts pointed out that the split between ad servers and trading platforms may reshape the digital advertising value chain and spawn more neutral advertising infrastructure service providers. However, some legal experts have warned that forcibly splitting complex technology ecosystems may face execution problems, and we need to be wary of collateral damage caused by third parties to small and medium-sized enterprises that rely on Google technology during the split process.

Currently, the global digital advertising market is closely monitoring the progress of this case. Jurisdictions such as the European Union and the United Kingdom have simultaneously launched investigations into Google's advertising business. The ruling in this case may provide an important case reference for multinational technology antitrust enforcement.