HONG KONG — China on Tuesday introduced a flurry of retaliatory measures towards the U.S., together with tariffs on imports of merchandise resembling coal, liquefied pure gasoline merchandise and crude oil, in addition to an antitrust probe into Google. It additionally positioned two different U.S. corporations on an unreliable entity checklist that would bar them from investing in China.
China and Google have had an extended and entangled relationship going again to the early 2000s.
This is a have a look at Google’s historical past in China and what the antitrust probe means for the corporate:
Google launched Chinese language-language search engine google.cn in 2006. It was censored to adjust to Beijing’s legal guidelines, and in 2009, was a significant search engine in China with about 36% market share.
In 2010, in response to a cyberattack and an growing unwillingness to adjust to censorship guidelines, Google stated it was not keen to dam search outcomes and shut down its Chinese language search engine, redirecting customers to its Hong Kong website as a substitute.
Beijing later blocked Google providers underneath its Nice Firewall censorship system, together with its e-mail service Gmail, in addition to its Chrome browser and search engine, making it inaccessible to customers in mainland China.
China usually blocks most Western web platforms, resembling Google, in addition to social media platforms together with Fb and Instagram.
Though Google providers usually are not accessible in China, the corporate nonetheless maintains a presence within the nation, primarily centered on gross sales and engineering for its promoting enterprise. It additionally has workers engaged on providers together with Google Cloud and buyer options.
Google maintains workplaces within the main Chinese language cities Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen.
China’s State Administration for Market Regulation stated Tuesday it was investigating Google on suspicion of violating antitrust legal guidelines.
Whereas regulators didn’t present additional particulars, the announcement got here minutes after the 10% tariffs imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump got here into impact.
As there are few particulars on what precisely Google is being investigated for, the speedy impression on Google operations is unclear, though its present standing is unlikely to be affected by the probe, which might takes months.
Google didn’t instantly touch upon the investigation.
Some consultants imagine that the antitrust investigation is prone to focus on Google’s Android working system for smartphones and used as a bargaining chip within the U.S.-China commerce struggle.
John Gong, a professor of economics on the College of Worldwide Enterprise and Economics, stated that the investigation might be associated to Google’s dominance within the Android enterprise, as just about all smartphone manufacturers aside from Apple and Huawei must pay licensing charges to Google to make use of the Android system on their units.
“Now, this time, Google is placed on the chopping board. However I feel it’s nonetheless an investigation, proper? It hasn’t reached a choice but,” stated Gong, including, “I feel it’s very a lot negotiable.”
Huawei developed its personal HarmonyOS working system after it was positioned on the U.S. entity checklist — international people, firms and organizations deemed a nationwide safety concern — in 2019, which prevented it from doing enterprise with U.S. corporations together with Google.
Google has been accused of violating antitrust legislation in different nations, together with these within the European Union, South Korea, Russia, India and Turkey, for allegedly abusing its market dominance.
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Related Press author Ken Moritsugu in Beijing contributed to this report.