Google bribed manufacturers not to install third-party app stores on their devices

Epic’s antitrust complaint has revealed new details about how technology giant Google is trying to undermine other Android app stores. According to The Verge portal, Google launched a program called Premier Device in 2019, through which it provided smartphone manufacturers with a higher share of search revenue. The only condition was to pre-install only the Google Play store and no other app store on the device.

Some manufacturers have included almost all of their devices in Google Premier

Manufacturers received up to 12% of Google search revenue from Premier Edition devices. Before that, they received a share of only 8%. In addition, some companies such as LG and Motorola received a 3 to 6% share of what their smartphone users missed in the Play store. It was these two companies that included almost all of their devices in the program.

The huge Chinese conglomerate BBK, which, among other things, manufactures and sells Android smartphones under the Oppo, Vivo and OnePlus brands, has involved approximately 70% of its devices in the program. Other manufacturers took it more easily, for example, Sony registered only 50% of their smartphones and Xiaomi only 40%.

With this program, Google has succeeded in consolidating the monopoly of the Play store

Epic claims that Google tried to keep the program secret from the public. However, he sees the program as a great success in consolidating the dominance of the Play store among Android app stores. In short, Google was able to achieve what it wanted with this program.

Another part of the complaint showed that users rarely download apps outside of the Google Play store. A 2017 internal Google report states that only 4.4% of applications in the U.S. were installed from another source.