EU: Google antitrust case not affected by US FTC ruling - Telegraph.co.uk

It added that although the FTC had closed its investigation, other regulators would follow a different course. "The good news is that other antitrust agencies, within the United States and overseas, are still examining Google's conduct. In Europe Vice President Almunia has made clear that he will close his investigation of Google only with a formal, binding order that addresses search bias and other issues. We remain hopeful that these agencies will stick to their established procedures, ensure transparency, and obtain the additional relief needed to address the serious competition law concerns that remain."

The European Commission has for the past two years been investigating complaints against Google, including the claims rejected by the FTC that it unfairly favoured its own services in its search results.

Google presented informal settlement proposals to the Commission in July. On December 18 the Commission gave the company a month to come up with detailed proposals to resolve the investigation. If it fails to address the complaints and is found guilty, Google could eventually be fined up to 10 percent of its revenue - a fine of up to $4 billion.

Google is widely believed to have made concessions to the FTC to resolve the case, without admitting any wrongdoing. In Europe, Joaquin Almunia, the competition Commissioner, said that Google and the Commission had "substantially reduced" their differences since talks began in July.

Eric Schmidt, Google's executive chairman, has offered to make changes to the way the search engine operates but Mr Almunia said he is expecting a "detailed commitment text" in January.

Yesterday FTC Chair Jon Leibovitz said, however, ""Many of Google's competitors wanted the commission to go further and regulate the intricacies of Google's search engine algorithm. Today the commission has voted to close this investigation unanimously. Although some evidence suggested Google was trying to eliminate competition, Google's primary reason for changing its look and feel or algorithm was to improve search results."