Five Billion Reasons Google Needs to Sweeten Offer to Avoid EU Antitrust Action

In April, Google offered to address the four major issues under contention by, among other things, displaying links to competitors closer to where it displays its own services on search results pages. The EU competition committee chairman said today that Google’s proposals are “not enough to overcome our concerns.”

Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) has kept the pressure on the EU to demand more concessions from Google before agreeing to a settlement.

Earlier this year Google avoided further investigation by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission by agreeing to change how it displays search results and to license certain standards-essential patents to all comers. Google’s share of U.S. search traffic is a mere 70%, which, though monopolistic by most standards, is not deemed by federal regulators to stifle competition.

The company’s dominance in the EU could cost them a fine of up to 10% of annual revenues unless the company reaches an agreement with the competition committee. Google’s total revenue in 2012 was just over $50 billion. That’s gives the company about 5 billion reasons to reach a settlement.