In October, the Russian regulator Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) believed that Google broke Russian Competition rules with its policies on pre-installed Android apps. FAS announced during the time that it's only allowing the Mountain View-based company until Nov. 18 to amend its guidelines.
Now, the Russian archrival Yandex is taking the legal battle to the European Union. On Friday, Nov. 13, Yandex reported it had requested the EU to conduct an investigation on the practices of Google pertaining to the Android mobile operating system.
"We think that the Russian finding of abuse of dominance is instructive, and is a conclusion that can readily be adopted in other jurisdictions, including the EU," said the Russia's largest search site.
Yandex is only one among the firms to protest about Google's mobile OS. Alongside Yandex consist of Portuguese app store Aptoide, U.S. tech firm Disconnect and lobbying group FairSearch. FairSearch consists of Expedia, Microsoft, French price comparison site Twenga and TripAdvisor. British mapping company Streetmap EU Ltd. is likewise reportedly suing the tech titan due to a loss of website traffic.
Yandex stated it is expecting that the EU will help in reestablishing fair competition and guaranteeing equal opportunity to pre-install mobile apps on devices which run Android mobile OS, not only for Google but for other developers as well. The company added that the growth of its business in Europe relies on the result of the EU's investigation.
In August, the market share of Yandex drastically dropped to 50 percent share at the start of 2014. In September, the company notched 57 percent, as compared to its 62 percent share way back in January 2014. LiveInternet.ru, however, revealed that from 34 percent, Google's market share improved to 42 percent.
In the meantime, in April this year EU competition regulators started off a formal investigation into the shopping service of Google. It also started out a probe into the Android bundling issue to find out if it was deserving of an official case.
Google's spokesperson Al Verney said device makers can use Android with or without Google apps. He further said that customers have complete independence to make use of rival applications.
